D&D 5E A NEW interview with Mike Mearls

[Umbran]

Thank you for not answering my question. That was very not informative.

It looks like a pretty direct and reasoned response to your question.

 

[JEB]

I'm becoming a broken record by this point, but I'm still concerned that this marketing plan doesn't appear to include a place for DMs to get the monsters (and other things) they need for existing D&D settings without buying mega-adventures.

Very, very good point. Monsters haven't been addressed yet, so they're a big x-factor in these plans. Maybe this means they have plans for yearly Monster Manuals of some sort and simply haven't felt the need to mention it... or maybe this is going to be just the problem you point out. (Perhaps even a deliberate incentive for DMs to buy the adventure books.)

That said, thus far, the monsters for the adventures have released as downloadable online supplements (outside of a handful of monsters only available in print). If they continue that pattern, we should be able to get a regular selection of new/converted monsters for free. Though such releases are to a proper Monster Manual what bread and water are to a steak dinner...

 

[Nebulous]

WotC shared info on how low subscriptions got? Man, you've seen something really major! Please try to remember! Do you even remember which site it was or who was interviewed? You say you saw it quoted here on EN World? The only ones I'm aware of recently are the one in the OP here and Mearls' Reddit AMA the other day, but it's neither of those.

Yes, i saw that too. It wasn't much, but it did mention that sales were not good for the magazines and there would not be a print edition.


THAT SAID...........does anyone read Gygax magazine, the imprint from Gary's son? I imagine it would continue supporting 5e 100% in the same capacity of the classic Dragon magazine. Hell, they even use the same font and advertisement styles.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

I haven't read the last issue of Gygax, but I've got the first three. Them supporting 5e would be wonderful and help subscriptions I'd hope.

 

[Cybit]

I'm becoming a broken record by this point, but I'm still concerned that this marketing plan doesn't appear to include a place for DMs to get the monsters (and other things) they need for existing D&D settings without buying mega-adventures. They will put out a player's guide for the adventure paths they create, and then the one or two books with the adventure itself (like Tyranny of Dragons) but the only thing mentioned at all about campaign setting books was the tentative language about maybe probably someday somehow, not now, but possibly then, we might have a Forgotten Realms campaign setting.

As someone who wants to buy official products to populate the worlds and planes with the inhabitants I expect to be there, I'm concerned I'm going to end up having to buy hardcover adventure books I don't want every year just to get the scattered monsters that I do want.

I'll be surprised if the upcoming Elemental Evil Adventurer's book doesn't include genasi. But I'll be surprised it if does include aasimar or (Planescape) tieflings. So there are 3 books I'll need to get my Elemental Planes stuff. Then when they decide to put out a Gith-based adventure path, I'll have to buy 3 books to get my Astral Plane stuff.

And then Dark Sun...no way around a monster manual there. It uses a completely different set of creatures than the rest of D&D. Does it get an exception, or get the shaft?

Tying all the new content to "story" in the sense of "adventure path" just doesn't work for those of us who aren't going to use that story and have to buy hundreds of pages of it to get the content we expect in a D&D edition.

I think a combination of a second MM with the monsters from various adventures & D&D Basic updates will probably help this. HotDQ / RoT are probably going to be oddballs in that they were developed concurrently with the MM, so I'm not sure they are totally indicative of a going forward plan.

 

[Zardnaar]

Yes, i saw that too. It wasn't much, but it did mention that sales were not good for the magazines and there would not be a print edition.


THAT SAID...........does anyone read Gygax magazine, the imprint from Gary's son? I imagine it would continue supporting 5e 100% in the same capacity of the classic Dragon magazine. Hell, they even use the same font and advertisement styles.

The subscription info was in the magazines themselves. IIRC Dungeon in 2007 had around 20k subscribers with 30k+ printed. Paizo said they were making money on them as well, not vast amounts but they were not losing money.

I suspect WoTC thought they would be the centerpiece of DDI and the subscribers would come along as well. 2/3rds stayed with Paizo though and the PDF quality was horrible both in content and layout and art/cartography.

Dungeon under Paizo was maybe the best it had ever been with maybe the 1E issues being exceptions, Dragon not so much. The WoTC 4E Dungeons were terrible.

 

[Mistwell]

The subscription info was in the magazines themselves. IIRC Dungeon in 2007 had around 20k subscribers with 30k+ printed. Paizo said they were making money on them as well, not vast amounts but they were not losing money.

I suspect WoTC thought they would be the centerpiece of DDI and the subscribers would come along as well. 2/3rds stayed with Paizo though

2/3rds did not end their subscription with Paizo, but that does not mean that some of those same 2/3rds did not also buy WOTC products. Some people bought stuff from both companies. Some people liked the content from those WOTC PDFs. I know I got a lot out of it. And DDI subscription rates were relatively high.

 

[Zardnaar]

2/3rds did not end their subscription with Paizo, but that does not mean that some of those same 2/3rds did not also buy WOTC products. Some people bought stuff from both companies. Some people liked the content from those WOTC PDFs. I know I got a lot out of it. And DDI subscription rates were relatively high.

Yup but then there are estimates about how much D&D was worth, how much Paizo is worth in 2012, how big the RPG industry is, the size of the staff of Paizo vs WoTC and interviews with Monte and Ryan Dancey in August where he estimated D&D lost about 2/3rds of the player base from 4E. There are a lot of bits of information pointing to the scale of the collapse. It also explains things like products getting cancelled 2 years into 4E run and 5E being announced 3.5 years into a supposed 10 year run (4E PHB) an 4E going out of print entirely in 4 years, D&D going out of print for 2.5 years. That has never happened before in D&D history including TSR going under. They can't produce Dragon or Dungeon even in PDF, they can't produce a monthly or bi monthly book and the staff size is 15 vs over 50 for 3.0 should tell you the things right there. They need to rebuild the brand.

It should get better for D&D because it can't really get any worse and 5E appears to have sold well and the reception has been quite good it seems with even the detractors being more meh than foaming at the mouth haters.