D&D (2024) PC Gamer: It's clear Hasbro, the custodians of D&D, have no idea what to do with Baldur's Gate 3's success

Accidental double post

MothMayI said:

The black character who has far and away the least dialogue and screentime of all the main characters?

The black character who was originally intended to be a fake wannabe hero and hypocrite?

The black character who was made someone who needed to consort with a bottom-tier fiend to get magic powers to contrast him with the white guy who was so awesome at doing magic a goddess had the hots for him?

Next you'll tell me Larian isn't racist because they didn't bother finishing Karlach's storyline at launch and retconned her dialogue instead of actually giving her the intended good ending to her questline, and aren't racist because Lae'zel's entire personality is an extension of her entire people being written as Stupid Evil since their writers don't see anyone who isn't a human or elf having any identity outside of their species.

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It's quality, not quantity, he's got a cool story and his Patron is alot of fun too. Plus his dad is very important & powerful politician in BG, two great black characters for the price of one!

MonsterEnvy said:

since when is 5e 2024 dead?

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I'm sure I would have heard about that.

I’m no expert…and many many of you will confirm that I’m sure….but it don’t think we needed a magazine article to tell us that WotC is dazed and confused when it comes to D&D.

wicked cool said:

It’s funny how we criticize Wotc and yet Bg3 is kind of the anomaly. I did a search early today on the best RPGs similar to Bg3 and similar to dragon age.
Multiple articles and Reddit posts all came up with a list over the years and some of the titles are 10+ years old like Planescape and Skyrim
BioWare had multiple titles on the list and BioWare blew it with basically 3 failures in a row

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I mean, this is just reflective of the state of the games industry. 10+ years ago, big single-player RPG series were what the publishers were willing to stake money on. Nowadays, they only want to fund live service multiplayer games. Anthem notwithstanding, BioWare's string of failures are all mostly the results of not being given the resources to do what they used to be known for, and do it well.

KYRON45 said:

I’m no expert…and many many of you will confirm that I’m sure….but it don’t think we needed a magazine article to tell us that WotC is dazed and confused when it comes to D&D.

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I guess I still see a lot of people acting like things are going great. As I think about it, I'd say they'll come out aggressively when people say things aren't going well, which is really a different thing. I think clarification from a source other than me, who I must tell you, is nobody, is important. And as I read the article, I thought it was pretty solid and not just a text version of clickbait.

I sure hope that WotC is able to turn given the most recent events and have a great year, because I love D&D. Big positive news would be pretty surprising to me, but I hope it shows up. This article is more for people who are only casual fans, and I think it's also something we can refer to from the future to see how accurate it was.

SteveC said:

I guess I still see a lot of people acting like things are going great. As I think about it, I'd say they'll come out aggressively when people say things aren't going well, which is really a different thing. I think clarification from a source other than me, who I must tell you, is nobody, is important. And as I read the article, I thought it was pretty solid and not just a text version of clickbait.

I sure hope that WotC is able to turn given the most recent events and have a great year, because I love D&D. Big positive news would be pretty surprising to me, but I hope it shows up. This article is more for people who are only casual fans, and I think it's also something we can refer to from the future to see how accurate it was.

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Don’t get me wrong; I want D&D to succeed. But I think we’re past needing WotC for that.

KYRON45 said:

Don’t get me wrong; I want D&D to succeed. But I think we’re past needing WotC for that.

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I think I agree with you on this. I really think the next couple of years are going to show if this is true or not. Someone is going to have to step forward. I have just always believed that WotC (and TSR before it) took a lot of the slings and arrows of people who don't like RPGs, and let smaller companies just exist. They also represent RPGs to everyone who isn't a roleplayer. Time will tell, and I hope you're correct!

SteveC said:

I think I agree with you on this. I really think the next couple of years are going to show if this is true or not. Someone is going to have to step forward. I have just always believed that WotC (and TSR before it) took a lot of the slings and arrows of people who don't like RPGs, and let smaller companies just exist. They also represent RPGs to everyone who isn't a roleplayer. Time will tell, and I hope you're correct!

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Hang on….someone on the internet agreed with me?!! I have to call my mom!!!!

While I’m sure D&D will always be the Kleenex of RPGs….they kind of opened the door to obsolescence when they (oh man, not this again) started giving away the milk for free.

And now I’m counting the number of faux pas in that statement.

Hasbro is doing the same thing it always does - target maximum profits. When it does this, it favors profits over goodwill - but assumes the goodwill they have currently will remain steady as they squeeze customers more and more. As a result, they fail.

If Hasbro wants to grow the D&D brand, the 5 biggest steps I'd take would be:

1.) Get a BG3 show in production ASAP - animated with the voice talent from the game and with voice talent from every voice actor that ever touched Critical Role, Diemension 20, etc...
2.) Go back to Larian and ask Sven to recommend someone to lead BG4. Make it clear that whoever is hired will be given a longer leash than Larian had.
3.) Fix 2024. Errata is absolutely required to address ridiculous oversights.
4.) Restore the most permissive OGL and make a pledge that it will not change for 20 years.
5.) Focus on brand positive advertising that shows people the dedication to rebuilding the D&D brand by making high quality products that serve the entire community at a competitive price.