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

[Velderan]

I think in terms of predictions, my main worry would be something like the chain that led to 4e. Here's what went down with that:

1. 3e launches in 2000 and sells incredibly well. Star Wars d20, also released that year, is also a huge sales hit.
2. By the end of 2001, sales have trailed off. Work on 3.5 starts in early 2002 or so.
3. 3.5 releases in 2003. The changes to the game are kind of random and rushed, and are designed to make the D&D collectible miniatures line an integral part of the game.
4. The minis sell well, but D&D book sales slump back down after a brief spike. Initial concepts for 4e begin in 2004, driven by a pitch to shift D&D to a digital platform similar to World of Warcraft. The game enters full design in 2005, with a target release of 2008. The game's design is driven by MMO-style play and a reliance on miniatures.
5. Meanwhile, D&D miniatures costs start to go up and sales start to go down. During the same period, many companies launch MMOs to compete with WoW, but none come close to matching its success.
6. D&D 4e launches in 2008, sells great for a 3 to 6 month window, then craters.

Fundamentally, 4e failed because all of the plans around it were based on two things that proved wrong:

• The core game play of WoW was portable to other games. It wasn't.
• D&D miniatures were a sustainable, growing business. They weren't.

When a business becomes shaky or is shrinking, there is pressure to deliver a perfect, long-term plan immediately. That pushes you to overly rely on current trends and extrapolate them forward, rather than engaging in deep R&D to figure out a durable solution.

Part of 5e's success came from rebuilding the team's R&D capabilities. It's easy to forget, but in the years before 5e launched the D&D team won the Origins Award for best board game three years in a row. That patience paid off with 5e.

All of this is to say that what happens next depends on whether 5.5 is hitting its sales mark, and what that prompts Hasbro to do. My biggest worry is that there's a knee jerk reaction toward moving ahead with a radically different game design. If they perceive 5e as a dead end, they'll be under huge pressure to do something completely different.

All we can do is read the tea leaves, but seeing them go back to a product each month starting in July is not a good sign. It feels like something a team is told to do to make up for a budget shortfall. Do you have faith, given the rules issues in the 5.5 rulebooks, that giving the team less time to make mechanics is going to lead to higher quality products?

So my question for you and @WinningerR is do you think it's possible that the key to 5e remaining stable is maybe not in the sales of books, but rather the success of the new VTT when that launches? From my understanding, WotC has allocated a lot of resources into creating it and to me it seems like the type of product that the folks in the C suite making decisions are going to expect a big return on. There was a lot said by previous folks in charge about the brand being undermonetized and their desire to see the type of recurring spending you see in video games, which a VTT could potentially fit that model from a few different perspectives (subscription fee to use it, separate transactions to buy digital minis or maps, etc).

 

[mearls]

I would assume that the level of staffing is factored into how many products you announce / can create. So where does the work for the additional products come from? Did you overestimate how much work the originally announced product would require, are you overworking the people?

When people are working on a game they love, in an economic environment where games are shrinking, with the message that a new product has to be added or cuts will be made, tend to just do more work.

I worked on 4e while on my honeymoon because we had deadlines to hit. I spent my Christmas break in 2018 writing huge swathes of Ghosts of Saltmarsh. I had to because the rest of the team was re-writing another product almost entirely from scratch.

Gaming relies on passion to keep costs down. It's not just a WotC thing, it's a game industry thing.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

As an example, take a look at the Hiding header on page 19:

"The Dungeon Master decides when circumstances are appropriate for hiding. When you try to hide, you take the Hide action."

Then look at the Hide action on page 368:

"With the Hide action, you try to conceal yourself. To do so, you must succeed on a DC 15 Dexterity (Stealth) check while you're Heavily Obscured or behind Three-Quarters Cover or Total Cover, and you must be out of any enemy's line of sight"

Those two sections contradict each other. One says the DM decides when you hide. The other gives specific conditions.

That's an extremely clear point and yes, that's a straight-up contradiction of the kind I'd expect to find in some slightly half-baked late edition of Shadowrun or something, not in a fancy WotC-produced D&D book. Because that's quite a fundamental contradiction, and as you point out, not clarified at all by the DMG. Also it feels like the page 19 approach is frankly better, because there will be conditions where hiding is appropriate, but where the page 368 rules aren't met.

 

[mearls]

So my question for you and @WinningerR is do you think it's possible that the key to 5e remaining stable is maybe not in the sales of books, but rather the success of the new VTT when that launches? From my understanding, WotC has allocated a lot of resources into creating it and to me it seems like the type of product that the folks in the C suite making decisions are going to expect a big return on. There was a lot said by previous folks in charge about the brand being undermonetized and their desire to see the type of recurring spending you see in video games, which a VTT could potentially fit that model from a few different perspectives (subscription fee to use it, separate transactions to buy digital minis or maps, etc).

I honestly don't know enough to say. It all comes down to their business model, how they expect it to monetize, what kind of users they are targeting, and what users do with it once it launches.

 

[SlyFlourish]

Speaking personally... I don't see any rules issues in 5E24 that are over and above the various rules issues that were in 5E14. So if you all were able to make completely serviceable stuff back in 2014, 2015, 2016 with your smaller team... I don't see why that shouldn't happen again in 2025, 2026, 2027 with the larger one.

Especially considering there hasn't been any consensus as to what were/are the rules issues in either 5E14 or 5E24 because every table plays their game differently. So one table's bug is another table's feature.

The big power creep of weapon masteries is the only thing that jumps out as a possibility. We'll have to see the more play we have but they're already ubiquitous in the games I'm playing. The problem with power creep is that once its out there, there's no take backs. Look at the continual conversations about Silvery Barbs and that was one spell in one MTG focused adventure book.

There are a solid handful of these in D&D 2024. The spell-infused weapons and armor, for example. Any game that opens up to a player's selection of an uncommon item suddenly has to deal with a character casting shield six times a day.

That sort of stuff is permanent in the game and future design has to be built around it. It's one of the big motivations to move to a new system -- the house clean.

 

[darjr]

I can break things down in detail when I have time, but there are several areas in the 5.5 books that show the team was incredibly rushed. As a starting point, compare how the PHB explains interaction, exploration, and combat. How rules are explained in each section, and how each section uses the rules glossary, varies.

As an example, take a look at the Hiding header on page 19:

"The Dungeon Master decides when circumstances are appropriate for hiding. When you try to hide, you take the Hide action."

Then look at the Hide action on page 368:

"With the Hide action, you try to conceal yourself. To do so, you must succeed on a DC 15 Dexterity (Stealth) check while you're Heavily Obscured or behind Three-Quarters Cover or Total Cover, and you must be out of any enemy's line of sight"

Those two sections contradict each other. One says the DM decides when you hide. The other gives specific conditions. Maybe the DMG clears this up. Let me pull that up and look at the Hide action's definition there.

There isn't one. So which is it? Does the DM decide, or does cover and obscurement determine if you can hide?

The point isn't to bash the rules. It's to show that this is exactly the kind of issue that arises when a team doesn't have the time needed to straighten out things like that.

The core rulebooks are the optimal environment. They had four years and were working from an existing game with a list of known issues to correct. How do follow on products work with far less time and building out wholly new stuff?

I’d like to add that part of 4es problem is that it was also rushed and not quite done upon release.

Also I’m not sure sales are slumping, just not as big as some might think they should be with a new set of books.

If even the growth in sales maintains what it was it’s possibly a larger growth then in most of D&Ds history.

But by all reports it did bump, a lot by some, retail reports especially.

Still, is it good enough for the new climate of sales and for WotC with a huge 3D vtt to support?

 

[Staffan]

If I was leading the D&D team I would be tracking two paths:

1. Current model: minor updates to 5e to make it as evergreen as possible
2. 6e: ground up rebuild.

If possible, you might be able to merge the two. So the speculative work you are doing on 6e could inform changes to you make to 5e. But if says fall to a point that a new edition is needed, you already have, hopefully, several years of design work on its replacement under your belt.

If I was feeling spicy, I'd add a third path: other RPGs as trial balloons. Star Wars Saga was mainly based on the d20 Modern chassis (mainly in the way classes alternated between selectable class features called Talents, and bonus feats chosen from a class list; as well as the expectation that you'd multiclass a lot to get the desired mix of abilities including more specialized abilities from prestige/advanced classes), but previewed many 4e features: advancement in basically everything based on level, binary-ish skills, non-AC defenses instead of saves combined with offense always being the one to roll. Now, Wizards doesn't have the Star Wars license anymore, but they could get a similar result by doing a Gamma World RPG, or maybe Star Frontiers (if a certain gritster's efforts haven't ruined that name forever), and using that as a test bed for mechanics before locking D&D into using them.

Of course, the appropriate time for this would be roughly now, in order to properly develop the new game, have people play it for a year or two, evaluate its success, and maybe iterate on the idea in another game before it gets to prime time.

 

[dave2008]

I can break things down in detail when I have time, but there are several areas in the 5.5 books that show the team was incredibly rushed. As a starting point, compare how the PHB explains interaction, exploration, and combat. How rules are explained in each section, and how each section uses the rules glossary, varies.

As an example, take a look at the Hiding header on page 19:

"The Dungeon Master decides when circumstances are appropriate for hiding. When you try to hide, you take the Hide action."

Then look at the Hide action on page 368:

"With the Hide action, you try to conceal yourself. To do so, you must succeed on a DC 15 Dexterity (Stealth) check while you're Heavily Obscured or behind Three-Quarters Cover or Total Cover, and you must be out of any enemy's line of sight"

Those two sections contradict each other. One says the DM decides when you hide. The other gives specific conditions. Maybe the DMG clears this up. Let me pull that up and look at the Hide action's definition there.

Interesting. I don't seem them as a contradiction. To me, this is clearly the process:

1. The DM determines the circumstances are acceptable for Hiding.
2. The player decides to take the Hide action.
3. to be successful with the Hide action, it must meet all the requirements of page 368

I don't see what the issue is here. What am I missing. This seems very clear to me (though I admit I am weird and always have been).

@Ruin Explorer can you clarify - you always seem to be good at pointing out mistakes I make or things I miss.

 

[SlyFlourish]

So my question for you and @WinningerR is do you think it's possible that the key to 5e remaining stable is maybe not in the sales of books, but rather the success of the new VTT when that launches? From my understanding, WotC has allocated a lot of resources into creating it and to me it seems like the type of product that the folks in the C suite making decisions are going to expect a big return on. There was a lot said by previous folks in charge about the brand being undermonetized and their desire to see the type of recurring spending you see in video games, which a VTT could potentially fit that model from a few different perspectives (subscription fee to use it, separate transactions to buy digital minis or maps, etc).

Is it me or does it feel like WOTC is strangely silent on the 3d VTT? It feels like I haven't heard anything about it in months.

I'll make a big hairy prediction you can call me out on later. I don't think the 3D VTT, if and when it comes out, is going to be a big deal at all for one major reason -- it requires installation on a PC. D&D Beyond works on everything without needing to install anything. It works for in-person games and online games. The 3D VTT is super niche just by needing a PC client. I'm pretty sure I can't even run it at all and I'm a pretty big D&D nerd.

I don't know how we would measure this when our insights are very likely to be opaque, but I don't think the 3D VTT is going to be successful at all. About half of the DMs I've surveyed use D&D Beyond. What percent do you think will be using the 3D VTT a year after it comes out? I'd bet 5%.

I think it was super smart for WOTC to put more resources behind the 2d "Maps" part of D&D Beyond. It was a very smart hedge on the bet on the 3D VTT when you absolutely could have seen an executive questioning why you'd have resources for both. I think Maps is going to be far more successful than the 3D VTT simply because it runs in a browser.

 

[dave2008]

If I was feeling spicy, I'd add a third path: other RPGs as trial balloons. Star Wars Saga was mainly based on the d20 Modern chassis (mainly in the way classes alternated between selectable class features called Talents, and bonus feats chosen from a class list; as well as the expectation that you'd multiclass a lot to get the desired mix of abilities including more specialized abilities from prestige/advanced classes), but previewed many 4e features: advancement in basically everything based on level, binary-ish skills, non-AC defenses instead of saves combined with offense always being the one to roll. Now, Wizards doesn't have the Star Wars license anymore, but they could get a similar result by doing a Gamma World RPG, or maybe Star Frontiers (if a certain gritster's efforts haven't ruined that name forever), and using that as a test bed for mechanics before locking D&D into using them.

Of course, the appropriate time for this would be roughly now, in order to properly develop the new game, have people play it for a year or two, evaluate its success, and maybe iterate on the idea in another game before it gets to prime time.

Yep, that is a great idea. 3 paths it is!