D&D (2024) Do players really want balance?

[pemerton]

Is the current brand of D&D offering reliability and consistency?

I don't see any real evidence of this. It's very common to encounter complaints of inconsistency in D&D experiences. And rather than reliability, the game is said to depend very heavily on the particular GM who is running a session/campaign.

 

[FrogReaver]

Yes, this is how I can tell that Transformers films are better than The Seventh Seal; or that The Hunger Games is a better novel than The Wind Up Bird Chronicle.

They are all wrong. Cat in the Hat is the best novel ever!!!

 

[Oofta]

I'm not. If people want to argue for it on its own merits, that's fine. But the moment it popularity is used as part of the argument for that, I think its entirely legitimate to bring in all the other things that can lead to popularity. But people don't like that, so away we go.

Then how do you do it? There are only a few measures of quality. You can look at the editing, which overall is excellent. The layout and presentation which was always good but is improved in the 2024 edition. The physical product, which WotC has little control over, has had issues but when I received faulty books all I had to do was send them back to be replaced. They were replaced quickly and they also sent me an additional product as compensation. So by those measures, I'd say it's a quality product.

Beyond that? How well does the design hit it's goals? While it's in a nice market, it is a game designed for broad based appeal and a game that most people want to continue to play year after year. That's where ignoring popularity is just smacking yourself in the face to ignore the obvious. It's not just that initial sales were good, every version of D&D has had that. It's the number of people that keep playing the game and the number of new people that also choose to play. We measure that how? By popularity and sales, the fact that the game has seen year after year of double digit growth and dominates the industry. There is no other way.

You like to say that McDonalds isn't any good. Except I disagree. As a fast food (which will never be healthy fine dining), their restaurants are clean and well lit, their food is consistently prepared and relatively cheap. You go to a McDonalds and you know what you're getting. But D&D accounts for 70% (1) of the playing D&D on Fantasy Grounds. McDonalds doesn't have anywhere near that kind of dominance in the fast food industry, they're #5 for sales per store (1) out of the top 5 fast food restaurants. Of course the restaurant business if far different from the TTRPG market and physical presence doe matter, people are going to go to a location that is close while books for any game can be ordered online. The total number of locations of McDonalds compared to all other fast food restaurants? They have 14% of the stores (2). In other words, in no way shape or form do they dominate the fast food industry, they just happen to be the biggest single restaurant out of the top dozen chains.

In order to be as dominant in the TTRPG market, you have to have something other than just advertising and name recognition. If that was all that was necessary, there is no reason for previous versions to see an initial burst of sales and then fall off after a short period of time.

 

[FrogReaver]

Yes, this is how I can tell that Transformers films are better than The Seventh Seal; or that The Hunger Games is a better novel than The Wind Up Bird Chronicle.

On a more serious note:

I'd implore you to consider that how you rate a film or novel is a complete mess of cherry picked comparative criteria, weightings with no basis and subjective evaluations.

IMO, what you consider 'better' says more about you than it does about the product in question.

 

[FrogReaver]

Then how do you do it? There are only a few measures of quality. You can look at the editing, which overall is excellent. The layout and presentation which was always good but is improved in the 2024 edition. The physical product, which WotC has little control over, has had issues but when I received faulty books all I had to do was send them back to be replaced. They were replaced quickly and they also sent me an additional product as compensation. So by those measures, I'd say it's a quality product.

Beyond that? How well does the design hit it's goals? While it's in a nice market, it is a game designed for broad based appeal and a game that most people want to continue to play year after year. That's where ignoring popularity is just smacking yourself in the face to ignore the obvious. It's not just that initial sales were good, every version of D&D has had that. It's the number of people that keep playing the game and the number of new people that also choose to play. We measure that how? By popularity and sales, the fact that the game has seen year after year of double digit growth and dominates the industry. There is no other way.

You like to say that McDonalds isn't any good. Except I disagree. As a fast food (which will never be healthy fine dining), their restaurants are clean and well lit, their food is consistently prepared and relatively cheap. You go to a McDonalds and you know what you're getting. But D&D accounts for 70% (1) of the playing D&D on Fantasy Grounds. McDonalds doesn't have anywhere near that kind of dominance in the fast food industry, they're #5 for sales per store (1) out of the top 5 fast food restaurants. Of course the restaurant business if far different from the TTRPG market and physical presence doe matter, people are going to go to a location that is close while books for any game can be ordered online. The total number of locations of McDonalds compared to all other fast food restaurants? They have 14% of the stores (2). In other words, in no way shape or form do they dominate the fast food industry, they just happen to be the biggest single restaurant out of the top dozen chains.

In order to be as dominant in the TTRPG market, you have to have something other than just advertising and name recognition. If that was all that was necessary, there is no reason for previous versions to see an initial burst of sales and then fall off after a short period of time.

Right, continued popularity doesn't prove it's the best product, but it proves it's a quality product. Especially in the information age, where one can quickly find out other peoples potential issues with products.

 

[Oofta]

Yes, this is how I can tell that Transformers films are better than The Seventh Seal; or that The Hunger Games is a better novel than The Wind Up Bird Chronicle.

Based on what criteria? I remember a study done a while back. People were asked to taste, and rank wine, not knowing anything about the wine at all. Unless it was a person's job as a professional wine taster, people choose the low-to-middle cost wines. It wasn't until they were shown the label and the price that they deemed the more expensive wine higher.

Those people who judged wine for a living? They knew what qualities to look for, what made a wine expensive. Because they knew what made a wine more expensive, they ranked the expensive wines higher. Quality is in the eye of the beholder. In an open competitive market with relatively low barrier of entry, I'll trust the judgement of the masses as reflected by sales growth and endurance over any one person's opinion.

 

[FrogReaver]

Then how do you do it? There are only a few measures of quality. You can look at the editing, which overall is excellent. The layout and presentation which was always good but is improved in the 2024 edition. The physical product, which WotC has little control over, has had issues but when I received faulty books all I had to do was send them back to be replaced. They were replaced quickly and they also sent me an additional product as compensation. So by those measures, I'd say it's a quality product.

Beyond that? How well does the design hit it's goals? While it's in a nice market, it is a game designed for broad based appeal and a game that most people want to continue to play year after year. That's where ignoring popularity is just smacking yourself in the face to ignore the obvious. It's not just that initial sales were good, every version of D&D has had that. It's the number of people that keep playing the game and the number of new people that also choose to play. We measure that how? By popularity and sales, the fact that the game has seen year after year of double digit growth and dominates the industry. There is no other way.

You like to say that McDonalds isn't any good. Except I disagree. As a fast food (which will never be healthy fine dining), their restaurants are clean and well lit, their food is consistently prepared and relatively cheap. You go to a McDonalds and you know what you're getting. But D&D accounts for 70% (1) of the playing D&D on Fantasy Grounds. McDonalds doesn't have anywhere near that kind of dominance in the fast food industry, they're #5 for sales per store (1) out of the top 5 fast food restaurants. Of course the restaurant business if far different from the TTRPG market and physical presence doe matter, people are going to go to a location that is close while books for any game can be ordered online. The total number of locations of McDonalds compared to all other fast food restaurants? They have 14% of the stores (2). In other words, in no way shape or form do they dominate the fast food industry, they just happen to be the biggest single restaurant out of the top dozen chains.

In order to be as dominant in the TTRPG market, you have to have something other than just advertising and name recognition. If that was all that was necessary, there is no reason for previous versions to see an initial burst of sales and then fall off after a short period of time.

One way to do it is to buy out the competition and then stop selling their products Very anti-competitive but also very historical. D&D hasn't been in the habit of doing that though.

 

[Oofta]

One way to do it is to buy out the competition and then stop selling their products Very anti-competitive but also very historical. D&D hasn't been in the habit of doing that though.

Yep. The "If you can't compete, buy them out and shut them down." Happened to my favorite fast food Mexican restaurant years ago when they were bought out by Taco Bell.

[rant]
Pretty much every chain of eyeglass manufacturer (and sunglasses like Ray Ban) is now run by Luxottica which is why it costs so much to get prescription glasses for most people. On the other hand the glasses I'm wearing right now cost less than $100 from a competitor, Warby Parker. Of course I'm wearing the simplest prescription possible, but they would have cost hundreds if I had gone to one of the big chains.
[/rant]

 

[FrogReaver]

I don't see any real evidence of this. It's very common to encounter complaints of inconsistency in D&D experiences. And rather than reliability, the game is said to depend very heavily on the particular GM who is running a session/campaign.

Depends on the kind of inconsistency and reliability you talk about.

D&D is consistently and reliably fun because of how dm’s run things to the preferences of their groups (some by catering to their group and some by DMing a specific style so hard only those who are really compatible remain). Having a 1 size fits all, one true way, consistent and reliable approach would undermine this.

 

[Oofta]

I don't see any real evidence of this. It's very common to encounter complaints of inconsistency in D&D experiences. And rather than reliability, the game is said to depend very heavily on the particular GM who is running a session/campaign.

Forcing one style of play, one setting with built in assumptions and goals is a reason many other games have achieved widespread acceptance. Having all of those predefined narrative choices made by the authors of the game may give people a better idea of what they're getting into, it doesn't make the GM any better at their role.