Advertorials with no game content in Dragon

[Corsair]

HOLY PARANOIA BATMAN!


I think that statement covers this thread nicely.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

HOLY PARANOIA, BATMAN!

I think that statement covers this thread nicely.

Actually, batmen is the subject of a different thread.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

It's not an ad.


No, they're not. It's a preview of content they believed a fair number of readers would be interested in reading about.

Your point -- "D&D stuff, please, not other stuff in Dragon" -- would work a lot better if you didn't make up new meanings for established words like "ad" to help express your outrage.

Outrage? I don't want video game promotions in Dragon at the expense of D&D content. I didn't realize that this was something worth taking to the streets over.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

I liked Dragon better when it covered more than D&D. Then again, I don't buy it now, partly because it only covers D&D. Obviously current subscribers are happy with the narrow focus (or they wouldn't be subscribers), so of course they're going to complain if Dragon widens its coverage. Paizo just has to weigh whether they're more likely to gain or lose readers by broadening their coverage a bit.

Well, I'd be all for broadening the coverage if it meant covering other RPGs. I fondly remember a few old Paranoia articles in the old days of Dragon that made it to my game table. I doubt this will happen, since it's probably not in WotC's interest to cover anything that directly competes with D&D. I figure they believe that video games are different enough that it's a way to attract a different audience to the magazine while not treading on D&D's toes. Still, it would be nice to see things like indie RPGs get some coverage, even if it were just a blurb in First Watch or the like.

 

[GQuail]

Fair enough, but if what we're talking about here is the most popular series of all video game RPGs, in the magazine devoted to the most popular of all tabletop RPGs, isn't someone going to have a "you got chocolate in my peanut butter" moment? I can't imagine that there'd be nearly this much of a negative reaction if we'd gotten, say, racial stats for moogles with the article.

I guess it's just a matter of how important those two pages are to some people. To me, bits and pieces of Dragon will always be "useless", so Id on't mind losting two pages: that's as much as I might lose if, say, there's a Class Acts on a class I don't use, or what have you.

I do agree that I'd probably get more D&D use out of, well, an article with D&D crunch in it rather than just a review. But to me it isn't that big a deal to have two pages in the magazine that I'm not using. I wouldn't like it to spread much more than that (there's a difference to me between "two pages" and "proper article") but the people who talk about the D&D material they've missed out on because of those two pages seem to me to be a bit, I dunno, more protective of Dragon than I am. ;-)

I suspect Silicon Sorcery didn't do well because, like articles on Eberron or FR, they tend to only attract people with a pre-existing interest in those settings: even if they're great and mineable for generic material, people can tend to cast them aside. But at least you've got an audience in Dragon genuinely looking for an article on Sharn or Waterdeep: stuff to do with random PS2 game is going to put off far more people who might not see it as exciting enough to bother with. The Novel Approach articles possibly do better because D&D players tend to be quite well read, whereas perhaps computer gaming is less universal? (Perhaps only in the younger age group of players?) I dunno. I don't think Dragon are making it up as they go long, tehre must be a logic of sorts - I trust them that much, at least. ;-)

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

But at least you've got an audience in Dragon genuinely looking for an article on Sharn or Waterdeep: stuff to do with random PS2 game is going to put off far more people who might not see it as exciting enough to bother with.

Right, and I'd much rather read an article on FR than on a PS2 game, even though both articles have about the same chance of containing something that will get into my game. Even if I don't read it, at least it's relevent to the kind of content Dragon is supposed to provide.

 

[GwydapLlew]

Even if I don't read it, at least it's relevent to the kind of content Dragon is supposed to provide.

Hrm. If you parsed that as, 'the kind of content I expect Dragon to provide," I think you'd be closer to the mark.

The Dragon (later renamed Dragon) covered gaming as a whole, although it has always focused strongly on TSR/WoTC/D&D. It has a history of covering a variety of games, even sharing space with Polyhedron a few years ago.

Yes, it has always been heavily focused on D&D. No, it does not focus exclusively on D&D.

 

[Vocenoctum]

Hrm. If you parsed that as, 'the kind of content I expect Dragon to provide," I think you'd be closer to the mark.

The Dragon (later renamed Dragon) covered gaming as a whole, although it has always focused strongly on TSR/WoTC/D&D. It has a history of covering a variety of games, even sharing space with Polyhedron a few years ago.

Yes, it has always been heavily focused on D&D. No, it does not focus exclusively on D&D.

I remember the old gray section in my Dragons, what was it, Ares? People complained about that enough that it got dropped. Eventually almost all non-D&D content was removed. For myself, I think the extra articles provide a bit of diversity in order to stretch out the great material as much as possible. You don't want too much A material, stuff some B in there too...

Either way, I don't mind non-D&D content, or even content useless to me, up to a point. That said, I think I'd rather see D20 Modern and/or DDM stuff in there, rather than video game stuff.

For me, it comes down to video games being a more visual/computer/tv format. I get XBox Magazine, and it's interesting sometimes, but all the stuff is already online anyway. It's not timely, nor as encompassing as online news sources. Same goes for Porn, I can get all I need online, so Dragon doesn't need to fill that niche for it's fans either.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Hmm, I wonder how a budget of one D20 Modern article a month would be greeted by a majority of Dragon readers.

 

[Vocenoctum]

Hmm, I wonder how a budget of one D20 Modern article a month would be greeted by a majority of Dragon readers.

Couldn't be any worse than Downer.

A simple two page thing like Class Acts could be fun I think, depending on the material. The best option of course would be along the lines of something that could easily be adapted to D&D too. The book on cyberware has suggestions for how to use them in D&D (as magical implants) and the idea doesn't need to be limited to such.