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

[SlyFlourish]

But the real question for anyone else in particular about any of this is "Does it actually matter?"

Now perhaps for someone like you or Mike Shea... designers who have to decide whether or not to hitch your future designs to the 5E24 wagon or not... trying to forecast 5E24's future is only doing your due diligence. That makes sense. But for the rest of the playerbase? Does it matter ultimately whether or not 5E24 lasts as long or does as well as 5E14 did? I don't know that it does. So it's more a discussion of curiosity rather than necessity.

I tend not to think much about where to hitch up my wagon. I write what I want to write for the systems I want to write for. I love 5e but I'm not in love with any one particular flavor so I've been writing for 5e. In City of Arches, I've included tables to help you find monsters across multiple 5e monster books. I didn't include subclass options. Backgrounds are lightweight and easy to modify. I have two monster stat blocks (which we're revising because I stupidly went with the "reaction" style legendaries and it doesn't look like anyone is sticking to that).

I want to write stuff for 5e regardless of the 5e people play.

I know other creators who spend a lot of time writing for specific brands of 5e – D&D 2024 or Tales of the Valiant – and they have specific things they want to write for that only those systems have. I'm much more interested in writing products that can be easily played not only with any 5e flavor but even other fantasy D20 games.

I actually don't have another big project in the works yet. I'm sort of seeing how things play out this year and focusing on small Patreon products for the short term while we get City of Arches out the door.

 

[SlyFlourish]

I don't know why you need to even consider that though. As a 3PP I can put out one product that is compatible with 5e14 or 5e24. It is not like I have to chose a lane, they are in the same lane!

This is the way.

 

[Azzy]

depends on the product, when I create new classes or subclasses, do I use the 2014 logic or the 2024 one? When I create monsters, which one do I use?

Whichever you prefer.

 

[SlyFlourish]

I guess I am just not seeing it. I have run 2014 things and 2024 things in my 5e game with no issues. I am confident I could run LevelUp content or Kobolds content with either and can mix and match all 4. If your 5e compatible your a are compatible with the whole galaxy of 5e products IMO. I don't think a designer needs to do anything different in terms of the product. The only difference I might make is in marketing (which I have seen some already do) and say it is compatible for both.

My Wednesday group is doing exactly this. We have three D&D 2024 characters, three Level Up Advanced 5e characters, and one D&D 2014 character, and it all works just fine. One of the players has been rotating back and forth between an A5e paladin (I can't remember what they're called) and a D&D 2024 paladin. What's interesting are the tradeoffs. When they switch, they end up missing something they got with the other flavor.

As a GM, it hardly matters to me. There was already a lot of gonzo stuff happening with 5e so new gonzo stuff doesn't really bother me.

My Sunday group is Tales of the Valiant and that's fun to see too and compare.

But it's all working fine and I still love running 5e games.

 

[SlyFlourish]

How have we been having discussions about 5E2024 without coming up with a better name we all agree on?

I respectfully submit Fifther Edition and 5 Fast 5 Furious.

I am now confident that we'll never come to an agreed upon name. I'm going with D&D 2024.

 

[dave2008]

My Wednesday group is doing exactly this. We have three D&D 2024 characters, three Level Up Advanced 5e characters, and one D&D 2014 character, and it all works just fine. One of the players has been rotating back and forth between an A5e paladin (I can't remember what they're called) and a D&D 2024 paladin. What's interesting are the tradeoffs. When they switch, they end up missing something they got with the other flavor.

As a GM, it hardly matters to me. There was already a lot of gonzo stuff happening with 5e so new gonzo stuff doesn't really bother me.

My Sunday group is Tales of the Valiant and that's fun to see too and compare.

But it's all working fine and I still love running 5e games.

Good to hear it is not just my group - thank you for sharing!

 

[BigZebra]

Very true, and as I think of it 5.5 and 3.5 are lining up to be eerily similar:

Both came out after a sharp surge in D&D sales and interesting - the 3e launch and the pandemic.
Both were a mix of random and sensible changes. The community hasn't really fixed on either's killer upgrade.

I think 5.5 is going to end up like 3.5. Remember, 3.5 launched in 2003. Work on 4e began initially in 2004 and in earnest in 2005. The x.5 upgrade just delayed the need for a new edition to revive the business.

Thank you for these posts! Given your impressive resumé, they make for a fascinating read.
I’ve long suspected that with the rise of online play—accelerated by COVID, no doubt—WotC might finally realize the 4e vision of generating significant subscription-based revenue.
That said, they’ll need to keep the 5e line active for a while to maintain fan satisfaction and loyalty.
The real gem, however, is 6e. A completely new edition designed from the ground up for online, subscription-based play. Anyway that's how I would strategize if I was a bean counter

 

[mearls]

I believe, as last time, they expect later runs to incorporate the early discovered errata changes that they've been inserting at DNDBeyond. Errata is part of the print run calculus for the first print, isn't it?

No. The initial print run for any product is based on its project sales. You want to print as many as possible to get the cheapest printing cost per copy and the best deal on shipping.

In terms of comparisons, the 5 month run is what WotC is comparing to the first 36 months of 5e. My point is simply this - why would WotC use that as their measure of success? Why share that measure when they specifically mention that they have other measures? How does that square with WotC's own public statements of characters made on DDB, which shows a decline in characters per month when compared to prior DDB statements made to the public?

 

[Chaltab]

I've been planning to use the tag '5Ecosystem' for future cross compatible 5E products.

 

[darjr]

I’ve been swimming in OSR gaming lately and the ease with which people just use content across the board is refreshing. Not just B/X anlikes either.

Also I think that we are not in the same sales climate pre 5e. I often hear from retailers still shocked how many more PHBs they sell in a month compared to pre 5e in a year.

I also think that if there was a huge uptick we’d know for sure, maybe. If there was a huge downturn we’d know.

The idea that a middle ground of selling well may mean a slump is near. But it’s so different now that it may also mean this is the new normal.