Dear Wizards of the Coast blog post...

[rjfTrebor]

this 'letter' reads like dialogue from a Michael Bay movie. It really might be the most arrogant and longwinded thing i have ever read.

WotC will never do what this person suggests, the game needs to change every few years and i think i can speak for a lot of people when i say that that's perfectly ok. if the new edition is fun, i'll play it. If it sucks, i still have all my old books.

 

[Kinak]

Thanks for that link, I'll check it out.

But how is attracting new customers by releasing old product splitting the customer base? They're not customers. That's the point. Wizards is trying to regain the grogs by making an edition that appeals to them. Bringing in new customers, or bringing back lapsed customers. Releasing the back catalog only sells old product to new customers or lapsed customers, not competes against new product.

There are people who held their noses at every new edition since AD&D. Some may come over to 5th, many won't. Wizards can only make money from these people by selling them AD&D. Otherwise not a dime from them. Back catalog, not competing against new product. The same can be said for 2nd, 3rd, 3.x, and Pathfinder fans. Some will come, many won't. How can Wizards make money from them? Sell them what they want. They don't want a new edition, clearly. The love and identify with older editions, so sell it to them, a lot of them aren't going to buy into 5th anyway.

That all assumes there's a clean break between people who will play a new edition and people who won't play a new edition. It's not nearly that simple.

Chances are pretty good, with the track they're on now, I'll buy some 5e books. If they released the 2nd Edition back catalog, a lot of those 5e slots would be taken over by Birthright or Planescape or Spelljammer books. That's not them getting money for nothing, that's them spending money for nothing.

And for every group that sticks with an old edition, there are people who can't convince their groups to switch back. Sometimes the reason is just that books aren't readily available. So if WotC converts a 5e group to an OD&D group, what do they gain? Nothing. And what do they lose? The market saturation they need for a multiplayer game, increased up-front cost per unit on the 5e books, and a reduced market for every future 5e book they produce.

So a new gamer wants to get into D&D. What do they buy? 5e? Less people playing that now. OD&D? AD&D? 2nd Edition? 3.x? 4e? If you know what your group's playing and you never need to change groups, sure.

Now, does the FLGS carry it? Does the book store? Are they going to keep carrying anything if their D&D customers are spread over six systems and a dozen settings?

If they never wanted to produce another edition, maybe. But it would cut 5e off at the knees.

Cheers!
Kinak

 

[darjr]

I think there might be a difference between TSR splitting their current purchasing customer base and wizards not selling stuff that current non-customers want

TSR sold more products but fewer numbers of each than they otherwise would have diluting their investment. Wizards is leaving money on the table by not selling things that otherwise would sell to folks who are not currently customers.

 

[darjr]

maybe?

 

[Stormonu]

We'll see how the model of reprinting old material goes when the core 1E books hit the shelves later this year. Somehow I doubt the 1E reprints are going to bury 5E (or 4E) by having two editions out at once.

I would really like to see the old material rescanned into a format that could be delivered as POD - some of the current copies are flat atrocious (my 2E PHB PDF has pages that are crooked, chopped and otherwise poor quality). And it is not a zero-cost effort to resupply this old material in a quality format.

 

[Sunseeker]

*blink*

"Sell junk to support your system" is precisely what the music, automotive, television, athletics, movie, agriculture, food service, retail, and publishing industries are built upon. Probably more where those came from.

I mean, just as an example, the reason High Fructose Corn Syrup even exists is because we were thinking up as much junk to make out of corn as possible to support the system of agribusiness.

Unless I'm misunderstanding you?

That's why my point continues on to say "Support your system until you've developed a better/more profitable one." Just like we've got the iPad, the iPad2, Intel i7 Quad-cores, AMD Hexacores, and all the various accessories for them.

The OP's statement is like telling Wizards they oughta build a computer running Windows 3.1 on a Pentium 1 processor and just support the heck out it. It's unlogical.

 

[Lanefan]

My first thought on reading that is if WotC did what she suggests then D&D would disappear from brick-and-mortar stores. This is something I would not like to see.

Besides, if I pay for a book I want a book, dammit, not a file that I then have to turn around and print out (and bind) myself.

Lanefan

 

[AngryMojo]

So, she's saying that a game company should stop making new games?

I'm also inclined to laugh at somebody who uses college textbooks as a proper publishing model, but lectures on planned obsolescence.

 

[Ranganathan]

That's why my point continues on to say "Support your system until you've developed a better/more profitable one." Just like we've got the iPad, the iPad2, Intel i7 Quad-cores, AMD Hexacores, and all the various accessories for them.

The OP's statement is like telling Wizards they oughta build a computer running Windows 3.1 on a Pentium 1 processor and just support the heck out it. It's unlogical.

Not quite. She's saying Wizards shouldn't leave money on the table and sell their potential customers what they want, what they've been begging for for years now. Access to new copies of the old material. She's saying Wizards should make the old stuff available as PDF and POD because it doesn't lose them anything, only gains them coin.

And before the "competing against themselves" shenanigans pops up again, go tell that to Crest and their 17 kinds of toothpaste. As a matter of fact, I think gaming is one of the few industries that doesn't have multiple versions of similar products on the market simultaneously from the same company. Apple has 3-4 versions of desktops, 2-3 versions of laptops, each with customization options. So too with cars, trucks, boats, RVs, TV sets, other computers, cable packages, crackers... just about every kind of business offers more than one and only one version of their products at a time. Hell, even publishing offers hardback, paperback, trade paperback, and ebooks of all stripes. Because they want to make money. Not selling customers what they want is bad business, pure and simple.

 

[n00bdragon]

I don't particularly care about the blog, but I'd like to point out that it's not a him, or a "Mr. blog man". A woman wrote this. She points out she's a wife and a mother right in the second paragraph.

It doesn't make a difference for the contents of the blog, or for people's reactions to it, but I suppose it just bothers me for people to just automatically default to thinking a long blog post about D&D was written by a guy.

And why would you assume they are telling the truth about that when every other qualification they claim is just as backed up? I'm not about to assume it's a woman either. Statistically though, it's probably a guy.