D&D 5E Could D&D Die Again?

[Blue Orange]

Hasbro can go bankrupt. It probably would not end the hobby as people can now make retroclones.

For the hobby to die out, all existing players have to die out and none join. Given there are players in their teens I'd say the game is likely to persist through the end of the 21st century. Frankly, given that all you really need is books, dice, and paper (the earliest rules even use six-sided dice only), it might even survive catastrophic social collapse as the survivors would likely have some leisure time eventually, and collective storyteling has a history in preindustrial cultures.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

I don't know about dying, but I could quite easily see Hasbro/WotC putting the wrong people in charge of design decisions regarding the next edition and alienating vast numbers of fans. I remain skeptical that enough of them learned the right lessons from 4e as is.

 

[Clint_L]

Okay, so we are defining "die" as "the publisher experiences a sales contraction leading to business problems."

Sure. It's inevitable. But that's a pretty weak definition of "death." The OP refers to three times this happened. I doubt any of them actually came close to literally killing the game, as even by the mid-80s, when TSR first almost went bankrupt, it had achieved a massive cultural footprint. Someone would have purchased it and kept the IP going.

The other thing to remember was that D&D still had strong sales at that time, though growth had greatly declined. But Gygax and the Blumes were terrible at business.

I presume the second time was when TSR went bankrupt, but again this was due to terrible mismanagement and they still were selling lots of product. If WotC hadn't bought them, someone else would have eventually.

In both cases lots of us kept playing the game right through the turmoil at the publication level.

I don't know what the third time was supposed to be. 4e? 4e was a failure but it didn't come close to killing D&D. If anything, it just led to the creation of a new D&D variant, Pathfinder, as well as D&D's most popular version yet, 5e.

D&D has been incredibly resilient. Because it is a fantastic idea. If it was ever going to die, it would have been in the early-mid 70s when it was still largely a word of mouth phenomenon. But since the 80s it's been to big to die.

 

[Zardnaar]

Okay, so we are defining "die" as "the publisher experiences a sales contraction leading to business problems."

Sure. It's inevitable. But that's a pretty weak definition of "death." The OP refers to three times this happened. I doubt any of them actually came close to literally killing the game, as even by the mid-80s, when TSR first almost went bankrupt, it had achieved a massive cultural footprint. Someone would have purchased it and kept the IP going.

The other thing to remember was that D&D still had strong sales at that time, though growth had greatly declined. But Gygax and the Blumes were terrible at business.

I presume the second time was when TSR went bankrupt, but again this was due to terrible mismanagement and they still were selling lots of product. If WotC hadn't bought them, someone else would have eventually.

In both cases lots of us kept playing the game right through the turmoil at the publication level.

I don't know what the third time was supposed to be. 4e? 4e was a failure but it didn't come close to killing D&D. If anything, it just led to the creation of a new D&D variant, Pathfinder, as well as D&D's most popular version yet, 5e.

D&D has been incredibly resilient. Because it is a fantastic idea. If it was ever going to die, it would have been in the early-mid 70s when it was still largely a word of mouth phenomenon. But since the 80s it's been to big to die.

1st time was the 70's and Blooms bailed it out.

Basically "die" is WotC getting itself into financial trouble and either D&D gets bought out or requires a bail out.

Basically another company ends up with it. Or WotC D&D goes out of print.

Not talking about clones and OGL "D&D'".

 

[Hussar]

The problem is it is worse now... HASBRO expects it to sell as it is or more... all it will take is going back to 3e numbers to make them panic

Evidence?

 

[Art Waring]

I think I have mentioned this in other threads a little, but d&d, and ttrpg's as a whole have evolved far beyond their wargaming roots to become something more than just the brand or the "lifestyle" trend going on.

ttrpg's are played in prison, where dice aren't allowed, but they still make their own out of paper templates. Inmates from all walks of life that would never come together in prison normally, now cooperate together as a team.

Its played in person, on the internet, youtube, and on PbP message boards like this forum.

It is being studied for its potential for use as a mechanism, for therapy in psychology circles.

Soon as they find an astronaut that is a ttrpg fan, they might even run a game in space, that would be quite a moment for ttrpgs. With commercial flights into high orbit now accessible to the wealthy, who knows what the future holds?

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Evidence?

what do you mean? evidence of how business' works?
or do you want evidence that I can see the future in a theory thread (spoiler none of us can see the future)

 

[Vaalingrade]

Basically "die" is WotC getting itself into financial trouble and either D&D gets bought out or requires a bail out.

Well we've got a thread about them getting an Elon Musk so...

 

[Clint_L]

1st time was the 70's and Blooms bailed it out.

Basically "die" is WotC getting itself into financial trouble and either D&D gets bought out or requires a bail out.

Basically another company ends up with it. Or WotC D&D goes out of print.

Not talking about clones and OGL "D&D'".

Okay, so not "die" in any reasonable sense of the word "die," since that's not what you are talking about at all. Setting the clickbait title aside then, the real question is whether D&D might come under new ownership. Probably, eventually. At this point it is a highly coveted IP, very much like Lucasfilms or Marvel, and it is not a stretch to imagine a bigger corporation than Hasbro wanting to get their hands on it. It's year-to-year sales are almost incidental; in fact, if it has some off years that will probably make it more of an acquisition target since it will become a better deal and the IP will be the real treasure.

If you look at the history of D&D, it is very much a history of the game being consistently acquired by larger and larger corporate entities. You don't think someone like Disney would be interested in this property? Their Pixar division already released an unofficial D&D movie.

 

[mamba]

Basically in the 70's they ran out of money and the Blumes put money in essentially Gary lost control of D&D at that point. That's the 1st time.

That was more a time where Gary did not have the money to get the thing started in the first place