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*Dungeons & Dragons
An adventure product I'd love to see from WotC
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<blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 6318418" data-attributes="member: 22424"><p>I heard that was "Encyclopedia Magica". However I'm sure I <em>also</em> heard that this was actually an urban legend, and not actually true. Though I can't find a cite for that, of course.</p><p></p><p>(Although it is true that while the Pathfinder Beginner Box cuts margins right to the bone, it is deliberately <em>not</em> sold at a loss. And, for much the same reason, I'm pretty sure the 5e Starter Set won't be sold at a loss.)</p><p></p><p>Ryan Dancey and Lisa Stevens have written at some length about the demise of TSR. One of the best accounts I've found is in the 25th Anniversary box. Basically, though, they had some really bad business practices (warehousing lots of old, and worthless, products; constantly doing Buck Rogers games that nobody was interested in; and the big one was competing with themselves with five or more heavily supported settings when most people use no published setting at all and <em>very</em> few people use more than one), coupled with two pretty huge disasters hitting at once (the market dropping out of Dragon Dice just after they'd massively invested; and their novel publisher returning huge amounts of unsold stock at just the wrong moment).</p><p></p><p>It's probably overly simplistic to point at a single thing and say that that was <em>the</em> reason TSR died. It was always pretty badly run. But while the boxed sets may well have played a part in it, I don't think that means that the <em>boxed set</em> in and of itself is a problem - you just have to get the right product at the right price.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="delericho, post: 6318418, member: 22424"] I heard that was "Encyclopedia Magica". However I'm sure I [i]also[/i] heard that this was actually an urban legend, and not actually true. Though I can't find a cite for that, of course. (Although it is true that while the Pathfinder Beginner Box cuts margins right to the bone, it is deliberately [i]not[/i] sold at a loss. And, for much the same reason, I'm pretty sure the 5e Starter Set won't be sold at a loss.) Ryan Dancey and Lisa Stevens have written at some length about the demise of TSR. One of the best accounts I've found is in the 25th Anniversary box. Basically, though, they had some really bad business practices (warehousing lots of old, and worthless, products; constantly doing Buck Rogers games that nobody was interested in; and the big one was competing with themselves with five or more heavily supported settings when most people use no published setting at all and [i]very[/i] few people use more than one), coupled with two pretty huge disasters hitting at once (the market dropping out of Dragon Dice just after they'd massively invested; and their novel publisher returning huge amounts of unsold stock at just the wrong moment). It's probably overly simplistic to point at a single thing and say that that was [i]the[/i] reason TSR died. It was always pretty badly run. But while the boxed sets may well have played a part in it, I don't think that means that the [i]boxed set[/i] in and of itself is a problem - you just have to get the right product at the right price. [/QUOTE]
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An adventure product I'd love to see from WotC
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