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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Raven Crowking" data-source="post: 5585150" data-attributes="member: 18280">It's not a consequence of new evolutions:  The WotC marketing survey while designing 3e indicated that people who use minis spend a lot more on rpg materials than those who do not.  As a consequence, it isn't difficult to understand why 3.5 was more mini-centric than 3e, or why 4e is much more mini-centric than 3.5.  And, try as hard as they did, WotC was unable to force enough people to buy prepainted minis to make that division viable.  (Personally, I think that this was largely because they didn't switch from random minis to boxed sets.)It is not an adaptation to the "environment" (at least, not in the sense of "what gamers want" is the "environment") -- it is an adaptation to a business model.  In this way, it is very much like the seedless watermelon or the commercial strawberry.  First, one determines what the impediments to sales are.  Then, one tries to remove those impediments.  Finally, one tries to convince the people who were already buying that the new product is better....or more evolved....or more developed.Meh.Nah.You'll have some 4e grognards, but I disagree that "for a particular time and place, 4e will be as perfect as any other edition".  Indeed, 4e heralded the fracturing of the fan base simply because that is not true.  It may be true for a diminished player base; it is not true for the time and place.I'm not arguing that WotC-D&D, in all of its incarnations (3e, 3.5, 4e, 4e Essentials) hasn't added interesting ideas or useful mechanics -- I am arguing that it is an experiment, akin to genetic experimentation, rather than an evolution.  You want to see evolution at work?  Then you have to allow the environment to play into change.  The OGL did that, and we saw many evolutions from 3.x games.I would argue that the aforementioned hacks (LostSoul's, the Jesters, the RC/4e hack) are evolutions of the game.  WotC's closed house?  Not evolution.  OTOH, when the e-tools are gone with the next edition, you might see something almost akin to extinction.RC</blockquote>

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