Complexity as a Barrier to Playing Dungeons & Dragons

[Scurvy_Platypus]

So now that we know that DnD has become more complex over the years (even 4e despite the marketing claims of the designers) do you think that going back to a simple edition would be good? Maybe a 5th edition where a combat grid is just an option and not a must and one where the dungeon boss does not have 1500 HP to grind down and one where there is much more focus on the adventures quality and the setting than on the "built" of a munchkin character? One where you as newbie and experienced player just can sit down at the table and play after 3min of rule explanation?

No, that's just having the pendulum swing back the other way; it's not a real solution, just switching the problem from too much complexity for one group, to too much simplicity for another.

What _needs_ to happen is for both groups to have an option. It's not likely going to happen though and my personal bet is that it will continue being more complex than less complex. The simplest reason is, the formula has worked so far and they're not going to take a chance when things are already iffy.

A very simple game as mainstream D&D probably won't happen. The economic reality is that the larger the company producing the game becomes, the less TTRPGs as a whole seem worthwhile to produce.

There's a certain element of truth, but more than that. Look at videogames and movies. 2 other industries where there's little done "outside the box", mostly just rehashing of what's already been done. If you can't describe your project in terms of how it's like 2 other already successful projects, it's difficult to get the go-ahead. I mean, Francis Ford Copella has a freaking wine business, just so he can finance doing movies he wants to do.

And let's be honest... gamers don't really reward things that are _that_ different. Most people don't, regardless of what the field is. Most people want a little something different, but not _too_ different. It's like sex... maybe for being different, they'll leave the lights off instead of on, or they'll try it in the living room instead of just the bedroom. But handcuffs? No, that's way too far out there.

Mechanical complexity v's complexity is one side of this. However, finding ways to encourage GMs to recognise and adapt to the skills gap between novices and experts seems equally, if not more, relevant when trying to get more players into the hobby.

I'd disagree. That's sheer laziness on the part of the game producers (designers and publishers). That's saying, "Here's this product we want you to buy. You need to go and recruit 5 other people to play it,you all need to buy the books, and oh yeah... One of you slobs needs to teach everyone else." Now, that's currently the way it's _already_ done.

And again, you're making the assumption that there _is_ a "skill gap". As if everyone is supposed to want to become this "expert".

Not everyone wants to be an "expert". Period. "Yeah dude, I know this totally awesome game. You're going to suck for a year or so, but after that you should be up to speed. You'll need to spend a few hundred dollars on books and you'll totally want to get a subscription to their online only service too. The usual schedule is to meet once a week for about 4 to 5 hours. So, when do you want to start?"

That's a sell that only works for a very particular sort of person.

Except that you don't need a large company to produce a full RPG any more?

And that really has nothing to do with anything. The conversation is about D&D. This board is pretty much about D&D and D&D is the number one game out there. Yeah, any hack with a keyboard can put out an rpg... and how are the actual _new_ players going to find out about it? Are all the small press, indy, free rpgs being put out geared towards new players? Players that prefer less complexity?

Complexity _is_ a barrier to playing D&D. Since D&D is the number one face for rpgs, that means that complexity is a barrier for getting people to play rpgs.

Pop quiz... have you played Faery's Tale, Witch Girls Adventures, or Best Friends? Have you even heard of them? How about Talisanta? How many groups do you know playing _any_ of them on a consistent basis? I'm willing to bet that for even 1 group that's even _heard_ of just one of those games, there's 5+ groups playing D&D.

Sure, there's plenty of lower complexity rpgs out there and even free ones. They're also almost never going to be found b rpg newbies; even amongst online gamers, a significant porton turn up their noses at them, unless they can buy a print copy in an rpg store.

Speaking as a fan and strong supporter of homebrew, small press, and indy rpgs? In my opinion, it's one step above ghetto gaming. You talk about shared narrative control (something that most rpg newbies expect since gamers lie and refer to rpgs as "shared storytelling") and most D&D GMs are going to sneer and mutter.

And leaving all that aside... Do you know what's _actually_ involved in putting together an rpg? Yeah, you can do it "cheap". And it's going to look cheap and appeal to a limited number of people too. Writing, editing, art, printing costs, distribution... It's not like you can type this up in Word and then sell it online and expect you're going to be getting _new_ people into the hobby that way. Hell, you'll barely get any of the freaking hardcore gamers to pick it up and they're already more inclined to give you money.

 

[pemerton]

You talk about shared narrative control (something that most rpg newbies expect since gamers lie and refer to rpgs as "shared storytelling") and most D&D GMs are going to sneer and mutter.

I still can't XP you in this thread - but another good post, and this sentence especially stood out to me as sad but true!

 

[The Shaman]

It's like sex... maybe for being different, they'll leave the lights off instead of on, or they'll try it in the living room instead of just the bedroom. But handcuffs? No, that's way too far out there.

So the Forge is basically just a BDSM dungeon, then?



Yes, pem, that one's for you.

 

[The Shaman]

There are just too many awesome games that come in a single box or volume, have about 20 or 30 pages of actual rules, and fill in the rest of the 40 to 100 pages with some spells, monsters, equipment, entry-level adventures, campaign background and the like, then leave me alone to get gaming.

Worth repeating.

 

[Glade Riven]

So what are the thoughts on dealing with the complaints of reducing complexity and shunting it off into splat books?

 

[Scurvy_Platypus]

So what are the thoughts on dealing with the complaints of reducing complexity and shunting it off into splat books?

Your question doesn't make sense to me.

Do you mean people complain about the game being too simple and that the additional complexity is shunted into splat books?

Or do you mean that the game could be simplified and additional splat books could have more complexity?

My own observation is that the game is complicated and then there's additional options (not more complicated, just differently complicated) added in splat books usually. Sometimes you might have a whole new system introduced (like mass combat) but mostly it's additional stuff of a "focused" (magic, or undead campaigns, or desert stuff, etc) nature that comes out in splats. Usually the folks that pick up the splats view it as "more options" which can be used or not, while folks that are already twitchy about complexity level see it as one more book that's adding another layer of rule and stuff to worry about.

And they're both right. It's just that since they're focused on different things, one sees a problem and the other sees a choice.

But also remember that in at least the case of 3.x D&D the nature of the game was changing, roughly every 5 levels according to Ryan Dancey. So you actually have a couple of different levels of complexity going on. I've only run a 4e game for a few months, so I can't speak too much to what's happening there in terms of the evolving complexity, but I wouldn't be surprised if there isn't some of that as well.

4e is a bit tricky as well, because they've got the whole Essentials thing. Which my understanding is that even though the line itself is limited, the design philosophy is going to inform 4e from now on. My understanding might be flawed, but if it is I'd say that's more a function of the whole point of 4e and how it relates to the game's evolution being left rather unclear (deliberately?) by WotC.

From at least some of what I've gathered, Essentials was supposed to be a "simpler" option for those folks that wanted it, but still fully integrated into the 4e rules.

Could you have a "simpler" game and then have splat books that add greater complexity? Sure. After a fashion, that's what the old BECMI series was in some respects. Of course it was also a seperate gameline from AD&D and while you could make the leap from one to another, there was a fair amount of difference between the two. Especially if you did it RAW which most folks didn't; RAW seems to have become a mantra later for most D&Ders.

The problem is, D&D is viewed as a single line. Produce a book that caters to one segment (complex or simple) and you leave the other one in the lurch. And gamers are notoriously fickle, requiring a constant stream of books to prove that a game is still "supported". No books and a game is "dead" or dying and gamers are jumping ship because they don't want to be left trying to find players for a "dead" game.

And like I've said, I don't see WotC starting up a second line of D&D again. I got the distinct impression there was a feeling that by having 2 lines (Basic and Advanced) they were losing sales from a line (AD&D) and making their lives more difficult by having 2 different games. 1 gameline means less people needed to produce books, less people needed for rules development, and an easier time to try and develop and market new materials. Instead of trying to decide if they're going to design Ebberon for Basic or Advanced or try and do 2 different versions and deal with the inevitable errors that will result, they just do Ebberron and are done with it. Folks that might have been working on a different version of it are instead working on one of the splat books.

In short, it's not worth the time and money for them to do so at this point. And if that means they lose some customers? *shrug* That's ok. They already spend enough time trying to appeal as broadly as possible, there's just sometimes you gotta be willing to not have some customers.

Heck, MTG springs to mind. A fair chunk of folks would really love an MTG setting book for D&D. They'd probably get a fair degree of cross-over between both D&D and MTG audience. But WotC hasn't done it and they're probably not ever going to do it, even if it's a "license to print money" in some people's opinion. Why? I honestly don't know. But the question surely has to have been raised more than once in the past decade and nothing has changed. So clearly WotC is fine with "losing" a certain segment of game playing population. In this particular context I mean "losing" in the sense that they're only collecting money on one end (D&D or MTG) rather then both; not that people were refusing to buy any WotC product because of the lack of an MTG setting.

These days... I dunno. I'd be honestly surprised and impressed if a company ran a Basic and Advanced version of their gameline. I know Paizo is supposed to be coming out with a "Basic" version of their game. I could be wrong, but what I'm expecting to see is basically a "crippleware" version of the Pathfinder rules, with support for a limited number of levels. They may produce some occasional extra bits for it, but I'm thinking that the idea is basically the same as the philosophy I've seen espoused in this thread... that people will play the "simpler" version until their skills have increased and they're "ready" for the full-on game.

The reality is, what's "good for the hobby" is not necessasarily best for business. Heck, look at the OGL. That was viewed as good for business and no consideration (that I'm aware of) given to the impact on the hobby. The resulting explosion was great for the hobby and certainly helped start a number of rpg businesses as well; but judging by how WotC has gone, it seems clear they don't consider it to have been good for _their_ businesss.

Practically speaking, I don't know that there's really a solution; at least not a professional one involving the owner of D&D. I think any solution is going to please some and upset others; that being the case, the status quo isn't going to be challenged because it's at least a relatively known quantity. A bird in hand is worth two in the bush.

 

[enpeze66]

No, that's just having the pendulum swing back the other way; it's not a real solution, just switching the problem from too much complexity for one group, to too much simplicity for another.

Your pendulum comparision is not really true, because it implies that both groups are equal in their numbers. I doubt this. Instead I am sure that there is greater number of players which would love a simpler rule system than those which are available today. Addtionally there are many more potential new players which you cannot reach with the current editions of rulebooks of 300+ pages.


As I already have said in the below thread, to cater only the current number crunchers and nerd crowd with is a major failure made by wotc which severely damages todays rpg industry.

Instead of concentrating on the nerd crowd which shrinks more and more each year, they should care about the masses of potentially players and and win older hands from the 80ties and 90ties (35-40y+) back.

I am sure WotC knows this problem very well and 2008 they tried to tackle it with 4th edition. But they were not radical enough in their quest for simplification and neither newbies nor a good number of old hands came back to the rpg. Main reason is that causals and vets with fat purses but without time didnt and dont want to read/learn the thousands of rule pages of the 4th edition system.


I dont want to repeat each point of the discussion here for time reasons but you can follow it in this thread

http://www.enworld.org/forum/genera...-century-d-d-solution-sort-6.html#post5487579

 

[Scurvy_Platypus]

Your pendulum comparision is not really true, because it implies that both groups are equal in their numbers. I doubt this. Instead I am sure that there is greater number of players which would love a simpler rule system than those which are available today. Addtionally there are many more potential new players which you cannot reach with the current editions of rulebooks of 300+ pages.

And I'm not implying that there's a greater number of folks in either group. I'd disagree with your assessement that there's a _greater_ number of players that want a simpler rule system. The main reason being that D&D has previously been estimated/stated by WotC to have a player base of 6 million people. It's not specified what the edition breakdown of that is.

However, the fact that millions of people haven't left D&D and taken up something else would suggest to me that while there are _some_ that would like a simpler rule system, the vast majority appear to be content to simply carry on.

As for the number of potential new players? Sure. As has been said numerous times already in this thread, complexity is a barrier.

The problem is that by simply making a single edition, you leave one group or another in the cold. When you don't _need_ to. This shouldn't be another sort of edition war, where instead of 3.x or 4e, it's "simple" vs "complicated". Every time the discussion starts to get framed that way, I'm going to resist it. I think it's _valid_ for people to like all the fiddly complexity that they do. I think they _should_ have a game that caters to them; fortunately they already have it and have had it for a decade now.

I just happen to _also_ think that a simpler solution should be available. It would be possible for folks to have their cake and eat it too.

In theory at least.

As I already have said in the below thread, to cater only the current number crunchers and nerd crowd with is a major failure made by wotc which severely damages todays rpg industry.

Instead of concentrating on the nerd crowd which shrinks more and more each year, they should care about the masses of potentially players and and win older hands from the 80ties and 90ties (35-40y+) back.

And I'll provisionally disagree with you. You appear to be arguing in terms of "what's good for the hobby." Put plainly and simply, WotC doesn't care. Period. Repeat after me, "The business does not care about the hobby, except as it exists to sustain the business".

Yes, you could argue that it'd be in WotC's "best interests" to care about the hobby and try and grow it. But the evidence seems to be that there's no concern about the "hobby" of rpgs. They hobby of D&D now... that's a slightly different story. They're all kinds of concerned about that, at least in the short term. And yes, one can argue that D&D is "the hobby" in a number of respects. It's a provisional arguement and one that I'd make in a different thread.

But at the end of the day, the question is "Who's going to keep the business in business?" And I'm pretty sure the answer is going to be, "Not the casual gamer". Or the "non nerd crowd" to use your apparent classification.

Anecdotally, the material that sells the most? Crunch. Rules. The complexity that is acting as a barrier to folks playing D&D in the first place. WotC is in business to make money, and the people that only want to buy a rulebook (and a simpler set of rules at that) are not going to be the ones sustaining WotC.

Is there a possibility that trying to appeal to the folks that are currently turned away from D&D would result in _more_ money? Sure. And it's just as possible that they _still_ wouldn't buy product too.

Meanwhile, it's highly probable that the people who _were_ buying material will _stop_ buying material, because it's no longer relevant to them.

So what you're looking at is this:

On the one hand: You lose some people that are turned off by the hardcore approach D&D and its fans take.

On the other hand: You might make more money, you might make less or the same amount of money, you almost certainly will lose current customers.

From my experience... that's just not something you even have to hesitate in considering, for most businesses. Keep what you've definitely got and try and figure out later how to increase it. I'm not saying it's "right", I'm not saying other businesses haven't taken the risk and profited, I'm saying it's the conservative and "safer" way to go.

I am sure WotC knows this problem very well and 2008 they tried to tackle it with 4th edition. But they were not radical enough in their quest for simplification and neither newbies nor a good number of old hands came back to the rpg. Main reason is that causals and vets with fat purses but without time didnt and dont want to read/learn the thousands of rule pages of the 4th edition system.


I dont want to repeat each point of the discussion here for time reasons but you can follow it in this thread

http://www.enworld.org/forum/genera...-century-d-d-solution-sort-6.html#post5487579

Ok. I read it. I'm not quite sure what your argument is. I'm not saying "Complexity isn't a barrier to D&D". I say it's a _big_ barrier. What I'm saying is that only having 1 version of D&D and then arguing about how complicated or simple it should be is a ... poor... approach to take. It shouldn't have to be all or nothing like you're arguing; however, from a business sustainability perspective it most likely _is_ all or nothing and WotC has clearly already picked one side.

I personally don't think 4E was supposed to be "simpler". Sure, certain things were streamlined but "simplicity" as an overall design goal? Heck no. The design goal was "Consistency" and "streamline". 3.x design was awfully loose in some respects (like monsters for example). 3.x design also (especially with 3.5) strongly pushed you in the direction of miniatures, but still left lip-service to "you can play any kind of game you want."

4e said, "Screw it. You're going to play the game this way and if you don't like it... sorry." It focused the goals of the system and then tried to streamline some of the elements they felt were interfering with that.

What I quoted above from you reads to me like you're saying "4E sucks because it's too complicated and WotC have lost themselves customers because of it." To which I'd say, no 4E doesn't suck it just happens to have a different goal than what you'd like it to have. And yes, WotC lost themselves some customers. Anyone that says you can keep everyone in business happy, is a dirty liar. It's not possible. The act of making some people happy is automatically going to upset others. The question is whether you can balance that happiness/unhappiness ratio.

The easiest solution would be to go back to 2 game lines; the basic and advanced like we used to have in D&D. But to me, I don't really know if it'd be the _best_ solution or not. It would _possibly_ benefit the hobby. It may or may not benefit WotC. The question then becomes, if WotC goes under (regardless of whether they're supporting the current complex ruleset or a mythical simpler one) what does that do to D&D in specific and the rpg hobby in general.

But that sort of leads further astray from the original question and my earlier points in this thread. So in summary:

Yes, Complexity is a barrier.
Yes, there should be a simpler game.
No, it shouldn't be done at the expense of the current game; it should be a second game on its own.
Given that D&D is unlikely to have 2 gamelines again, the current approach is most likely to continue, regardless of how "harmful" or "beneficial" it is; it's a known quantity which almost always is better than an unknown quantity.

 

[Zhaleskra]

From my personal experience, if you're having fun (or want to), you're willing to ignore complexity. It wasn't until I looked at D&D without the "I like this game" filter, that I began to see that, IMO, it's more complex than games with a reputation for being more complex than D&D.