D&D General D&D's Utter Dominance Is Good or Bad Because...

[Thomas Shey]

I used to buy WotC 5e books whenever they came out. Most of them never got used in a game.

We can play dueling anecdotes all day.

I acknowledged it can happen. As I noted, I bought a fair number of physical books myself back in the day. However, as I said, if you want to claim that people are just as likely to take a blind flier on a hardcover book as a PDF, no, I'm not going to think you're correct.

 

[Oofta]

It absolutely means that D&D can end up drowning things in availability. If there are 50 D&D groups present in your area, and 5 groups playing other games, its going to be vastly easier to find one of those D&D groups. And once someone is in one, its going to be easier to stay in it than do the non-trivial effort to see if there's something they'd like better has an opening. And no, that's not going to be the same if there's 20 D&D and 5 others.

In other words, no, I don't buy your premise here.

But if there were no D&D groups, there's no reason to believe there would be 5 others or that any of those 5 others would be something you wan to play. It also likely means fewer locations hosting games period.

Of course this is all speculation, I just don't buy that your premise is any more valid than mine.

 

[Thomas Shey]

But if there were no D&D groups, there's no reason to believe there would be 5 others or that any of those 5 others would be something you wan to play. It also likely means fewer locations hosting games period.

I've seen places with 1 D&D group and six others, so, yes, it absolutely can happen.

Of course this is all speculation, I just don't buy that your premise is any more valid than mine.

Then you don't, but I'm not going to give any credit to a premise that appears ludicrous on the face of it.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I acknowledged it can happen. As I noted, I bought a fair number of physical books myself back in the day. However, as I said, if you want to claim that people are just as likely to take a blind flier on a hardcover book as a PDF, no, I'm not going to think you're correct.

Well, you may be underestimating the pull WotC has on some folks to buy new books they publish, with the best of intentions to use them or just to read. I just don't think that most of those adventure paths purchased from WotC were actually used to run the adventure. At best they assisted in someone's homebrew, or were put out on a shelf because the buyer is totally going to run them, "some day".

 

[Oofta]

I've seen places with 1 D&D group and six others, so, yes, it absolutely can happen.



Then you don't, but I'm not going to give any credit to a premise that appears ludicrous on the face of it.

Well you claiming that even though the number of non-D&D games doesn't change it would somehow make it easier to find those games if there were no D&D is illogical so there you go. If there are 5 non-D&D games in your area with or without D&D, nothing changes.

 

[Campbell]

Fundamentally what we're looking at is a matchmaking issue. How much overall effort does it take to find and select compatible people to play the games you want to play. A higher volume player base where a smaller proportion fit the criteria you are looking for can make finding people to play with more difficult.

I'm a poor person to ask because I have never really found gamer spaces to a good place to find compatible players, generally opting to convert my more writer's club / anime club type friends into gamers. I have never really too much issue finding people to play with, but it hasn't been sensitive to changing market conditions.

 

[FrozenNorth]

Because you only need one book of names, and it doesn't even need to be system-specific. Anyone could make it, for relatively little effort and virtually no design sweat.

Every campaign needs NPCs. Meanwhile, only games that involve Domain Management require Domain Management rules.

 

[Shardstone]

Fundamentally what we're looking at is a matchmaking issue. How much overall effort does it take to find and select compatible people to play the games you want to play. A higher volume player base where a smaller proportion fit the criteria you are looking for can make finding people to play with more difficult.

I'm a poor person to ask because I have never really found gamer spaces to a good place to find compatible players, generally opting to convert my more writer's club / anime club type friends into gamers. I have never really too much issue finding people to play with, but it hasn't been sensitive to changing market conditions.

I find almost every commonly held problem, but not every commonly held problem, to be a matchmaking issue when it comes to D&D.

 

[Rystefn]

That's true to some extent, but all evidence I have is that WOTC has been very resistant to selling their core line in PDF form, and that means to buy and not use has a much higher overhead. That doesn't mean it still doesn't happen (I have a lot of ancient RPG books that show that) but I'd be perfectly willing to put a bet on the idea that more people are willing to take a flier on a PDF they don't expect to necessary use than a hardcover.

1) This was true long before pdfs were invented, to the point that in the 90s, they more or less openly admitted that their published adventures were written to be read, not played. (And they don't admit it now, but I rather strongly feel like it's still true, otherwise a lot of the glaring problems with a number of their adventures wouldn't exist.)
2) WotC is not selling pdfs currently, but they do make all of their books available digitally at a significant discount, so even if you were entirely correct about it not being very much of a thing with physical books, it would still apply perfectly well to modern D&D anyway.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Every campaign needs NPCs. Meanwhile, only games that involve Domain Management require Domain Management rules.

Your point? Are there not enough books of names that will work for 5e (by which I mean are there not enough books of names)?