Are Gognards killing D&D?

[Calico_Jack73]

This thread is too good to let die... time for a bump.

 

[Shortman McLeod]

Oh, I suppose I might buy some dice or software tools from time to time. Software tools could be a much stronger business line, such as 3-D dungeon visualizations -- I input my map, the tool converts it to a "PCs' point of view", and I hook that up to the TV for the players to look at as we play. Visually convey dark and narrow tunnels with flickering torches, grand ballrooms of demented wizard aristocracy -- yeah, I'd pay $50 for a "Virtual Castle Amber".

Uh, what about just using, you know, imagination? Isn't that, like, the whole point of tabletop RPGs? If you want "Virtual Castle Amber" there's always WoW or DDO.

 

[I'm A Banana]

If I live for a million lifetimes, I will never be able to tell all the stories I want to tell.

But until I'm brain-damaged, I will always find a way to tell whatever story I want with the tools I am given.

It's all about finding the right tools for the job.

4e looks like it will be a better set of tools.

If I want the resource management of an early-edition wizard back in the game, well, that's what they make house rules and supplements for. But, really, there's so many other things I want to experience (and new things I want to experience!) that I just can't get that attatched to loosing some things that I once wanted, knowing that if I want them bad enough, I can add them back in (or I can always go back and play a 3.5 game, after all).

Uh, what about just using, you know, imagination? Isn't that, like, the whole point of tabletop RPGs? If you want "Virtual Castle Amber" there's always WoW or DDO.

That's like saying people who love minis combat should just go play Candy Land or Monopoly or Chess.

There's a world of difference between "visual aid" and "totally new game."

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Uh, what about just using, you know, imagination? Isn't that, like, the whole point of tabletop RPGs? If you want "Virtual Castle Amber" there's always WoW or DDO.

Players just like to look at stuff, whether it's a mini, a hand-drawn sketch, the MM picture or whatever. As good as I am at describing an environment, a picture is worth a thousand words.

Players also seem to be less patient than they were when I was first playing D&D. Some start rolling their eyes when the descriptions start. Pictures save time.

I'll likely use in my next campaign the CRPG convention of "on one of the corpses, you find a scrawled map of this part of the dungeon" and hand it out -- because mapping takes TONS of time and rather boring descriptions of corridor lengths. I was thinking that just flashing on a screen "You see this" would give the players a much better idea of a room than if I were describing it in detail.

 

[The Little Raven]

Uh, what about just using, you know, imagination? Isn't that, like, the whole point of tabletop RPGs?

Funny, I thought the point was to have fun.

 

[Odhanan]

Funny, I thought the point was to have fun.

One doesn't exclude the other. One is the "what", the other the "how".

 

[Alceste]

I also think 4E will have a better set of tools to convey the stories that I have been telling since I started playing D&D a long, long time ago. The game does need to attract and grab more of an audience.

 

[PhantomNarrator]

Forgive me for saying this... but I think that this whole thread is something of a flamebait when you look at how it's named.

Asking the question "Are Grognards killing D&D" is surely not a good way of tamping down the fighting and incivility that's going on in the forums. It could very easily be turned back on you as "Are 4e boosters and MMORPG newbs killing D&D?" Which is something that I don't think would be well received either.

If you expect grognards to treat you civilly in return, a good first step might be not targeting them as "the problem" especially when you consider that they are the ones with the money that has kept the game afloat for a long while.

Now you posed the question



To which I reply, No...I'd say that if your market studies say that these big changes are going to bring in new gamers into the game world... then it's good for a NEW GAME. D&D as a brand has to mean something, or it means nothing. If you establish a brand and give it a certain meaning, and then change it into something it historically has not been ... you've just bait and switched your most important asset, your customer base. That's a good way to alienate them.

Soooooo QFT.

 

[helium3]

On the one hand, the only thing that sells are systems. Typical RPG consumers don't buy adventures, campaign settings, campaign setting supplements, and similar products.

I wonder if this really needs to be the iron-bound law people here seem to treat it like. Perhaps consumers would be more willing to buy fluff if so much of it didn't suck so hard. Granted, I'm no expert on the subject but many of the things held up as being "very good" by folks on the boards seem incredibly derivative and unoriginal to me. Not to mention incredibly poorly organized and designed to read like every other fluff book out there, rather than in a fashion that facilitates actually running adventures.

I can't shake the gnawing hunch that a fluff product that's well designed, with a layout that actually facilitates game play, and that contains original, fun and thought provoking material would sell pretty well.

 

[Dormammu]

I can't shake the gnawing hunch that a fluff product that's well designed, with a layout that actually facilitates game play, and that contains original, fun and thought provoking material would sell pretty well.

More often it just spawns a rabid fan following that stick with the world for decades after it leaves print. Not every printed campaign setting in the history of RPGs sucks, but none have been commercial successes. Worlds like Glorantha and Hârn still have very loyal followers out there, and even see things being published from time to time.

It would be nice if Wizards could make a setting at least good enough that it was a break-even product so they could justify it alongside the books that net them cash.