7 Years of D&D Stories? And a "Big Reveal" Coming?

When asked what he was working on, WotC's Chris Perkins revealed a couple of juicy tidbits. They're not much, but they're certainly tantalizing. Initially, he said that "Our marketing team has a big reveal in the works", and followed that up separately with "Right now I'm working on the next seven years of D&D stories". What all that might mean is anybody's guess, but it sounds like there are plans for D&D stretching into the foreseeable future! Thanks to Barantor for the scoop!

 

[Trickster Spirit]

Ah yes, the ever popular, we don't need you "you're fired" response.

Good luck with that.

If you want to pretend that a couple dozen people have zero representation of the overall market, you are fooling yourself.
It is funny that half the replies I get are about how my predictions of WotC losing fans is wrong and the other half (mostly from the same people) are about how outrageous it is that fans are not more patient with WotC.


One lesson that consistently successful business people learn is you have to go the extra mile to make customers happy.

Except that those couple dozen people (and by extension the segment of the overall market they represent) have all bought the core books already, so Wizards can and should safely tune them out at this point. It would be one thing if they were still trying to cater to that market with the sort of supplements they're looking to purchase, but they're clearly not interesting in selling those kinds of products. Instead they're targeting another market with an entirely different set of products and so should probably just focus on that instead getting absolutely nothing out of taking steps to address riotous online fanboy outrage that probably can't be quieted no matter what they do.

 

[Mark CMG]

Why isn't the explanation adequate in your eyes? There's eight people working on D&D, and the one who was in charge of the conversion docs isn't going to be able to do it for a couple of months. How much more detail do they need to go into? What situation is "truly is happening in their offices" that you're uncertain of, besides the obvious, that there's a very small team working on D&D stuff right now?

I find that to be more than enough to foster incredulity. They're a subsidiary of an international, multi-billion dollar corporation that lays off staff on a cyclical basis as a matter of course for their business plan that has no fallback position when their release schedule is crippled by the loss of one of their skeleton crew other than to tell their customers that they're just SOL for four months. And, again, this is an edition that was intended to bring forward the players from all of the previous editions and the first thing to go is the conversion doc that likely should have been available six months ago when the edition was first released. It's ludicrous.

 

[bogmad]

I find that to be more than enough to foster incredulity. They're a subsidiary of an international, multi-billion dollar corporation that lays off staff on a cyclical basis as a matter of course for their business plan that has no fallback position when their release schedule is crippled by the loss of one of their skeleton crew other than to tell their customers that they're just SOL for four months. And, again, this is an edition that was intended to bring forward the players from all of the previous editions and the first thing to go is the conversion doc that likely should have been available six months ago when the edition was first released. It's ludicrous.

I think the Free Release schedule is of a much smaller priority of a multi-billion corporation than the timely launching of products that people actually pay for. Notice how no one is saying wait 4 months for the Elemental Evil storyline.

 

[bmfrosty]

I find that to be more than enough to foster incredulity. They're a subsidiary of an international, multi-billion dollar corporation that lays off staff on a cyclical basis as a matter of course for their business plan that has no fallback position when their release schedule is crippled by the loss of one of their skeleton crew other than to tell their customers that they're just SOL for four months. And, again, this is an edition that was intended to bring forward the players from all of the previous editions and the first thing to go is the conversion doc that likely should have been available six months ago when the edition was first released. It's ludicrous.

I'm half of a 2 person IT department. If I'm out sick or on jury duty, my projects don't get done. They just get pushed back. I suspect its similar for these guys.

 

[Mark CMG]

I'm half of a 2 person IT department. If I'm out sick or on jury duty, my projects don't get done. They just get pushed back. I suspect its similar for these guys.

You're saying that you're half of a two person IT department for a division of a multi-billion dollar, international corporation and if you were out for four months they wouldn't find a way to get done what you would normally do. Particularly if one of your tasks was to take care of something that likely should have been accomplished six months prior and in between their were staffing reductions. Interesting.

 

[Mark CMG]

I think the Free Release schedule is of a much smaller priority of a multi-billion corporation than the timely launching of products that people actually pay for. Notice how no one is saying wait 4 months for the Elemental Evil storyline.

Bearing in mind that some of the products they have already released (core books) have in the past been accompanied by such a conversion guide even when the edition wasn't being touted (as this one is) of being the one meant to scratch the itch of all players from all previous editions. And further bearing in mind that they have a thinner release schedule by far than they have ever had in the history of their owning the property.

 

[bmfrosty]

You're saying that you're half of a two person IT department for a division of a multi-billion dollar, international corporation and if you were out for four months they wouldn't find a way to get done what you would normally do. Particularly if one of your tasks was to take care of something that likely should have been accomplished six months prior and in between their were staffing reductions. Interesting.

Day to day things get done, but projects that have no internal visibility past my minion and my boss don't get done. They just don't. Giving a conversion freebie the a thorough review and stamp of approval just isn't something I would expect to get done in this type of circumstance.

 

[Mark CMG]

Day to day things get done, but projects that have no internal visibility past my minion and my boss don't get done. They just don't. Giving a conversion freebie the a thorough review and stamp of approval just isn't something I would expect to get done in this type of circumstance.

Yeah, some folks keep referring to it as a freebie while others look on it as a already-long-overdue part of the edition roll out. Maybe some people don't understand that an edition that is being touted as the one that will bring everyone back to the brand, or forward from older versions of the brand, might apparently benefit from having a conversion doc that has seemingly been in the pipeline since at least just before the edition release (maybe much longer if they were looking ahead during the playtest). I'm not surprised that some folks who apparently do *not* need it are sloughing off the announcement as insignificant. It happens every time they make an announcement and some folks (not all) that aren't affected by the failure look on it as a non-issue. Not everyone is going to agree and that's fine.

As a D&D fan for quite some time, though, I have to say that there appears to be a steady stream of problems that stem from them cutting budgets and laying off employees. One of the most prominent being the advent of a rival company made up mostly of former employees that seemingly serves half of their former customer base. I guess it is a comfort for WotC employees to know that there are other places to work if/when the lay offs get around to them eventually. I find it all amazingly absurd.

 

[Kramodlog]

Goldomark - it is not the responsibility of the reader to try to read your mind.

I suggest they read my words and stop inventing words I did not say. It always help.

And, sure, we'd all love for WOTC to be more forthcoming. But, guess what? After the past four or five years, do you think there's the slightest chance of that happening? Really?

Yes. The backlash they had with 4e has nothing to do with communications. It was about crunch and fluff. 4e's failure was because of bad content, not bad communications or too much content (but it didn't help).

Good communications is good business, especially in a niche business like PnP RPGs where everyone knows everyone. Yes, that is a hyperbole.

After the crucifying[...]

I see. WotC is a martyr now. No wonder it needs defenders.

Then something goes sideways. We don't know what. But, now the product is cancelled. You get several passive aggressive "fanfic" style communications from the Morningstar team basically putting all the blame on WOTC and, now, what, six months later, people are still bitching about it.

In a perfect world everyone would be polite and bla bla bla. It is not a perfect world. Part of the job is handling communications. If they can't handle that, they should find another job or become permanent jurors. If they want a better attitude from people, they should have better communications. Seriously. People forgive people who are honest. Easily at that.

Take a look at a failed product from Paizo and Erik Mona talking about its cancellation:

No. Sales on the Campaign Cards have, unfortunately, been pretty terrible, so we're giving the concept a rest for a while and focusing on other types of card decks that seem to be more appealing.

I'm glad you enjoyed them (doubly so because they were my idea).

I only wish there were more folks like you out there!

http://paizo.com/products/btpy88r4/discuss?Pathfinder-Cards-Subscription#46

Paizo must be going bankrupt, right? Nerdrage, right? No. People understand. They get mad when they do not undertand (from lack of communications). They speculate or just get frustrated. And it is understandable*.

Note, at no point in time did WOTC actually say or do anything.

Part of the problem.

So, again, do you really think it's in their interests to be 100% transparent with fans who will make no attempt whatsoever to be reasonable?

Yes. People are reasonable. It is WotC's refusal to communicate that is unreasonable. This thread, and probably Perkins' tweet wouldn't exist with better communications.

I mean, good grief, you've got a 30 page thread right now bitching about what WOTC's doing.

Is it officially what WotC is doing? Cause if it is not, it could be unofficially non-cancelled.


*Notice I said understandable and not excusable. A nuance that is important.

 

[Kramodlog]

And, in case anyone's going to start jumping on me for white knighting WOTC, I'll point to you exhibit A: At Least 4 Months for Conversion Documents

Here we have WOTC being forthcoming and explaining why we don't have a conversion document. Fair enough, this is exactly what people have been asking for - more clarity. And here's a selection of responses:

See how fans come together and are understanding when WOTC actually does try to engage?

Didn't he know that jury duty was going to be a problem back in January when it was a problem for the Warforged?

"Yes, warforged will be up first - jury duty has messed with our plans, but stuff is moving along."

http://www.enworld.org/forum/content.php?2272-Warforged-Coming-to-D-D-Soon!#.VMI6ES686YQ

A conversion document seems much larger than a 6 pages PDF. Who is so important that they slow down the release of a 6 pages PDF?

At some point, unofficial vague tweets just become that.