D&D 4E Do you think WotC rebooting Forgotten Realms for 4e would be a good idea?

[Minicol]

Sacred cows have been sacrificed.

4e is covered in blood and laughing maniacally and telling you you're totally going to love this newfangled monotheism.

4e is pulling a Zeus on 3e's Cronus, nicking it's nads and setting up something almost totally new.

It happens my roleplaying budget was a sacred cow. Too bad.

 

[Minicol]

Clearly not. It's typical knee-jerk "omg change!" reaction, as Ed

The current FR products are not selling as well as they could be.

QUOTE]

So why bother at all with a declining world ? Why not create an interesting new world if you want to attract customers ?

Because it is too much work ?

 

[BlackMoria]

[Originally Posted by BlackMoria]
WotC are stupid and imho probably have nfc what they're doing with the FR, but hey it's possible the won't screw up I guess.


Is that an unfair summary of your post?

Thank you for the ad hominem attack.

To answer: yes, it is unfair summary of my post.

I will leave it at that.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

So why bother at all with a declining world ? Why not create an interesting new world if you want to attract customers ?

Because it is too much work ?

Because you can bring back a lot of ex-customers, who are far more likely to buy a reboot of a setting they once loved, than to buy some random new setting with an entirely new geography, geopolitics, cosmology, timeline, and minutiae to learn, I think. It's a valid question, but I think what WotC doing is potentially smart. Rebooting is always a tricky business, but I imagine a lot more people watched the rebooted Battlestar Galactica than would have watched an entirely new series with a similar plot, no matter how good. The name has power. This is a less severe "reboot", too.

On the money side, a new setting would require a lot more investment and advertising, and be more of a risk, too.

So given the choice between dropping the setting completely (no risk and no return), creating an entirely new setting (large risk, history shows the initial return is unlikely to be huge), and rebooting the Realms (moderate risk, potentially much larger return), it seems smart.

Of course, for this all to work, as I've said several times, the current FR has to not be making as much money as WotC would like. I.e. continuing with the current FR have to be low risk, definately poor return.

BlackMoria - Ad hominem? That doesn't mean what you think it means. Nothing I've said comments on you, but rather what you've said. You may well be a great guy, but your post made huge assumptions and didn't consider important factors. I have to admit I am kind of offended by seeing such a short-sighted post from someone with a Marcus Cole avatar, though, as it's very out of character for him

 

[WhimsyTheFae]

I am one of those who is likely to grab this "reboot" and give it a go. I lost interest in 2e, bought 3e and wasn't real pleased with the retcon and updates. I dropped it, but I don't despise the realms, I just don't like the state that they had gotten to in 2e or 3e.

I'll admit that all the 4e talk and debate and such has me excited about D&D again...that makes me happy.

 

[megamania]

I like the idea and I may pick up the campaign book as such.


Are you not curious is a sired son became this ruler or tried to redeem the family name? Has Elminister FINALLY given up the ghost? Drizzzt would remain along with the dwarfs. Wulfgar would not nor Cattrie.

Who else?

What wars / invasions may have been attempted but revolked (in time)

 

[Mokona]

So why bother at all with a declining world ? Why not create an interesting new world if you want to attract customers ?

Eberron had a very hard time getting traction early on and Wizards of the Coast invested an unusually large amount of money/effort on that project. New worlds are a hard sell!

So why would Wizards stick with a Neo-Forgotten Realms. Three simple reasons. R.A. Salvatore sells novels with his little drow buddy. More novels than any other author in their stable of shared world fiction. The initial 3rd edition Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting sold gangbusters. While I hate to admit it (because I dislike Elminster of Shadowdale)...those Ed Greenwood books also sell well. Forgotten Realms beats out Greyhawk because it is the primary source of fiction revenue for the company.

We get a reboot because something needs to be done about the poor sales of books like Champions of Valor and Shining South. Only hard core grognards of the setting are buying these products. There are not enough of those uber-fans to support the line. The other option would be to cancel the line for roleplaying support. Fans of the current timeline get to have their cake and eat it too. Don't advance the timeline of your home game and just use the new 4th edition rules material as if no justification is needed.

 

[jdrakeh]

Was it just because they hadn't published all the details yet?

They hadn't written all of the details yet. Somebody will undoubtedly say that Greenwood had it all mapped out from the start, though I can guarantee that events like the Time of Troubles were commissioned -- the event in question was custom-tailored to reflect the core rule changes in AD&D 2e (which themselves came about due to public allegations of the game being weighted toward "evil" social mores).

Settings grow. That's understood. The problem was that FR grew in horrible, uncontrolled, ways that had little to do with FR itself and everything to do with pandering to certain critics. It eliminated entire character classes, removed references to demons and devils, dispensed with old gods who were deemed to violent or amoral, introduced new gods who were 'bad' but signifcantly scaled back on 'evil', etc, etc, etc.

Later, bits of FR novels were retroactively grafted on to the Realms as part of an arguably successful marketing move, though said alteration resulted in yet another aspect of FR that is frequently decried by players (as opposed to readers). Notably, prior to official canonization of the novels, FR has one notable Mary Sue character in the form of Elminster -- afterwards, such NPCs were legion.

 

[Fenes]

I'll buy the sourcebook, but I'll not change my campaign to 100 yearsforward. I made my own custom FR world long ago, a darker, grittier setting, and won't wreck it just so it fits published adventures I'll never run anyway, or novels I stopped reading.

I'll just pick and choose what fits my campaign from the 4E FR.

 

[Samuel Leming]

The problem here is this. It is not a given that the changes will translate to extra sales.

Well, if they botch the reboot… That’s the risk.

Do a poll on what ticks most people off about the Realms and you will find the majority opinion is the uber NPCs and the novels.

Those are probably the main things pissing off the people still PLAYING FR now…

If I were to make such a poll I’d list 19 annoying things about the Realms with the twentieth item being "The sheer number of annoying things about the Realms." The last item would be some silly-ass flumph related way of saying there’s nothing annoying.

Anyway, the NPCs are an easy thing to get around. They’re off somewhere else or the DM can just remove the ones he doesn’t like. I’m sure many Realms-running Dms do just that.

The novels… are a worse problem because of their sheer quantity. Once again, a DM that really wants to run FR can just ignore what he doesn’t like.

I think the reason FR supplements don’t sell as well as WotC wants is that not enough DMs aren’t running it. Why aren’t they running it? The perception that there’s just too much to read & study! You have to read all that cruft before you decide what you’re going to include and exclude and heaven help you if one of your players is a already a Realms Lawyer, er, scholar. Many DMs want to run in a published setting because they want to save time over making their own. For a DM coming into it now, it would take longer to read the available FR material then to gin up your own world. Big lose!

That’s why I think WotC is going for the reboot. To simplify enough that DMs will run games with it and keep buying product.

The changes to the Realms isn't necessarily going to change the opinion of those folks because:

1) they will continue to do novels

2) we don't know just how much the uber NPCs 'got cleaned up'.

What is know is that Drizzt and Elminster 'survive' the transition. We know nothing about the other uber NPCs. If you are a person who absolutely loathes Drizzt or Elminster, what possible reason would you have to buy 4E FR products? The reasons for your dissatisfaction hasn't been addressed.

If Drow are balanced in 4e, Drizzt ceases to be a problem. He’s just a high level NPC. Elminster? Make him a 47th level Wizard and hold the cheese. End of that problem.

I suspect the reality will probably be this:

For the Realms fan, the changes will be too much.

For the non-Realms fans who have a distain for the Realms already, the changes will not be enough.

I think you’re underestimating the Realms fans. As I’ve already said, if the reboot is good and it’s simplified enough that new DMs can get a solid bite on it, it’ll sell.

Unless WOTC properly identifies what aspects of the Realms is keeping people away and addresses that, then these changes will not translate to more sales for WOTC. Making changes in the hopes that the final product has appeal to a majority of people is rolling the dice and gambling you get it right.

It doesn’t have to be a majority… It just has to be a lot more then are buy it now.

Sam