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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Treebore" data-source="post: 4609253" data-attributes="member: 10177">Polls most often use only about 1,000 respondents. Such polls accurately reflected how 230 million people voted last November. Within their +/-3 of error.That is why statistics is so powerful, you can ask only a few people about a specific question, or set of questions, and it will accurately reflect the opinions/choices of a much larger number.So 1,000 respondents on ENWorld, who are gamers from across the country, from every demographic that likely exists within the RPG community as a whole, will give worthwhile results.Even if most of them are DM's, those DM's do have a good feeling for what their groups feelings are.So this poll is a solid indicator. Could a better one be formulated? Definitely. However this information does reflect the general RPG gamer population, its accuracy may be high or low, but it will have a degree of accuracy, and that accuracy is identifiable once the formula's are applied.So even if the accuracy is only +/- 10% it is still meaningful, just less so than polls where accuracy of +/- 3% are achievable. So if I was to go for a better poll I would like better demographic information, such as age, income levels, marital status, etc...  However, that data would be for things beyond the question of this poll, such as possible financial implications on purchasing habits.This poll is a very good indicator of the base question, how many gamers play 4E D&D in comparison to some other form of D&D. WOTC would like to have everyone voting in this poll to vote for 4E, the fact that so many don't does tell them something meaningful, they aren't grabbing the hard core long term buying gamers like they would like too. The "serious gamer" is the group that the vast majority of their long term purchases come from, not the casual gaming community. ENWorld is definitely reflective of the serious portion of the RPG community as a whole.No, this poll would not be as valid on the WOTC boards. Presumably everyone there are fans of 4E, or the vast majority is. Same situation at PAizo, 3E fans are likely predominant on the Paizo boards. Here, and at other boards like RPG.net, you have gamers of all types, who don't play only "X" game or edition. So this board is the best place to get as broad a range of respondents as possible.The only way we will get better data is if WOTC sends questionaires to every mailing address they ever had for Dungeon and Dragon magazine, to reach players of every edition of D&D. Putting it in their 4E books won't work, you'll only get responses from people who play/like 4E or hate it. Hardly anything in between.So ENWorld is a very good pool of people to poll.</blockquote>

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