Parmandur
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Yes, and that's part of the product development process, a couple hundred groups play through the things and write detailed reports.Considering most of their modules are years-long campaigns…
Yes, and that's part of the product development process, a couple hundred groups play through the things and write detailed reports.Considering most of their modules are years-long campaigns…
Actually, they do: not that their system is foolproof or perfect, but they actually do that already.I suspect WotCs problem is that they simply can't put the time into iterative, complete-campaign playtesting. You'd need to run a bunch of groups through the entire campaign (faithfully as written!), then get all the feedback, synthesise it and make changes accordingly, then run through the same process again, multiple times, and then once you've finally got to a point where you're satisfied, publish the result as is without any further edits for space, word count etc. I don't know if this is how it's done. You probably have some groups testing the balance of individual combat encounters with parties of different composition, you might have some groups going all the way through but offering progressive feedback as they go, etc etc. And of course you probably have different authors working on the post-playtesting fixes to different bits of the campaign, and they might not be the same authors who wrote the material in the first place, and this whole process continues all the way up to the day you send the files to the printer. There's lots of places for things o go wrong.
Also to be fair, I suspect that if most 3pp campaigns were played by as many groups as WotC adventures, or were subject to the same level of scrutiny, then the same complaints would be levelled at them a lot more often. Writing campaigns is haaaard.
But...does it, really...?Guys, if you read the actual article, he tells you how that advice translates into a $1bn brand.
Guys, if you read the actual article, he tells you how that advice translates into a $1bn brand.
We did read it it's why it's kinda funny. Big money is in film, movie, game.
2. Haven't had a great game since 2E or good game since 3E.
2. I'm trying to think of a story that did have wide cultural appeal recently. Last one I can think of is Harry Potter, and even without Rowling's recent actions that was two decades ago. Are people just too fragmented? Part of the problem is I'm old so I'm not into what the kids are watching, though a lot of it seems to be anime from what I can tell, and Hasbro can't make that unless they move from Pawtucket to Tokyo.
I did read the article. His premise is that WotC should focus on growing the number of DMs exponentially and therefore selling more books, which is why all his advice is about how to make the books better.Guys, if you read the actual article, he tells you how that advice translates into a $1bn brand.
I did read the article. His premise is that WotC should focus on growing the number of DMs exponentially and therefore selling more books, which is why all his advice is about how to make the books better.
This is like telling Marvel they should have focused more on comics, back in 2008.
The only way to make a billion dollar brand off books is to diversify.
And his pyramid scheme logic (if there were only 10 DMs but every DM made one more per year, in 20 years there’d be 100 million DMs!) falls apart for the same reason as all pyramid schemes - there’s a limited number of potential marks.
I think some of his advice about making the books better is great, some is dubious, and some is basically what they already do. And I like Ben Riggs. But I don’t think you build a billion dollar brand by trying to exponentially grow the DM pool so you can sell 10X as many books.
I did read the article. His premise is that WotC should focus on growing the number of DMs exponentially and therefore selling more books, which is why all his advice is about how to make the books better.
Disagree. Agree until you get to "therefore". Therefore growing the player base and as such, the customer base.
The point of the article, IMO, is that the lack of DMs is a bottleneck that stifles growth of the brand. More DMs = more GAMES, not more books sold.
More games = more players = more customers.
I wouldn't say it's flopped. Going from Box Office Mojo, it's stayed in the Top 10 - the films that have dropped it down in the rankings are either films that are very much for kids (Mario Bros) or horror films that aren't going for the same audience (Renfield - Horror-comedy, The Pope's Exorcist - psychological/supernatural horror). Further, going from the total box office, it modestly surpassed its budget, and is still in theaters, so it has time to make more money.1. Movie just flopped.
I wouldn't say it's flopped. Going from Box Office Mojo, it's stayed in the Top 10 - the films that have dropped it down in the rankings are either films that are very much for kids (Mario Bros) or horror films that aren't going for the same audience (Renfield - Horror-comedy, The Pope's Exorcist - psychological/supernatural horror). Further, going from the total box office, it modestly surpassed its budget, and is still in theaters, so it has time to make more money.
By comparison, if you're looking for a flop, Babylon was nominated for multiple Academy Awards and had an approximately $80 million dollar budget, but only made $63 million worldwide. So, wait until it's out of theaters maybe before declaring it a flop?
I wouldn't say it's flopped. Going from Box Office Mojo, it's stayed in the Top 10 - the films that have dropped it down in the rankings are either films that are very much for kids (Mario Bros) or horror films that aren't going for the same audience (Renfield - Horror-comedy, The Pope's Exorcist - psychological/supernatural horror). Further, going from the total box office, it modestly surpassed its budget, and is still in theaters, so it has time to make more money.
By comparison, if you're looking for a flop, Babylon was nominated for multiple Academy Awards and had an approximately $80 million dollar budget, but only made $63 million worldwide. So, wait until it's out of theaters maybe before declaring it a flop?