D&D 5E Don't Throw 5e Away Because of Hasbro

[Faolyn]

No I meant pipeline.

I heard so much about the ever increasing costs of making a high quality RPG. if the fanbase shrinks, there won't be enough money to keep those million dollar kickstarters going. Increases in printing costs, real art from real not-AI artists, playtesters, video ad, stream ads, proofreaders.

I mean, will 5e fans be okay with mono colored text heavy paper books with little art because it's cheap?

Yes, I think so. I just might be more pdfs and print-on-demand rather than the way it is now. And honestly, from the kickstarters I've seen, many people are willing to pay for better art.

 

[Art Waring]

No I meant pipeline.

I heard so much about the ever increasing costs of making a high quality RPG. if the fanbase shrinks, there won't be enough money to keep those million dollar kickstarters going. Increases in printing costs, real art from real not-AI artists, playtesters, video ad, stream ads, proofreaders.

I mean, will 5e fans be okay with mono colored text heavy paper books with little art because it's cheap?

I don't really see the connection between successful kickstarters and wotc, I think you will have to clarify this so I can understand better what you are trying to say about them being correlated.

Yes, making a ttrpg can be expensive. But i think that perhaps expectations could be shifted a bit. There are plenty of games that use just black and white line art that do fine by their standards. Some games like Mork Borg and Into the Odd even make heavy use of (modified) stock art and art in the public domain. The only limitations these creators faced when making their game were the limits of their imagination, not the limits of their bank account.

Innovation doesn't need big corporate shareholders. Folks who are able to adopt creative solutions will find ways around the current physical & financial barriers, that's what i would define as innovative.

 

[ezo]

No. You just don't live in a certain bubble.

No, seriously, I live under a rock.

 

[Art Waring]

I mean, will 5e fans be okay with mono colored text heavy paper books with little art because it's cheap?

This comment is also very misleading, as some of the best looking ttrpg's were made in the 90's, many of which only had black & white art. Artists like Tim Bradstreet, RK Post, Clint Langley, and thousands of manga artists like Katsuya Terada would strongly disagree with you.

Black and white art has higher impact and greater detail than most color counterparts, and leaves no place to hide your mistakes. Some of the greatest (IMO) art in the world is black and white line art, just look at this example from the artist Katsuya Terada:

 

[SakanaSensei]

I don't really see the connection between successful kickstarters and wotc, I think you will have to clarify this so I can understand better what you are trying to say about them being correlated.

Yes, making a ttrpg can be expensive. But i think that perhaps expectations could be shifted a bit. There are plenty of games that use just black and white line art that do fine by their standards. Some games like Mork Borg and Into the Odd even make heavy use of (modified) stock art and art in the public domain. The only limitations these creators faced when making their game were the limits of their imagination, not the limits of their bank account.

Innovation doesn't need big corporate shareholders. Folks who are able to adopt creative solutions will find ways around the current physical & financial barriers, that's what i would define as innovative.

While I largely disagree with the person you are replying to, I do understand this particular argument.

In a world where DnD didn't exist:

• Matt Colville doesn't make a name for himself through Youtube by teaching people how to run a game better than WotC did.
• MCDM doesn't earn good will for making great products for a dominant gaming ecosystem. MCDM probably doesn't even exist how we know it to be.
• Without the Youtube channel centered on DnD and 30 issues of Arcadia/Flee Mortals, and then to a lesser extent their classes, even if MCDM did exist it probably doesn't make $4.6M on a game that is, even with shaking up sacred cows, largely based on tropes laid out by DnD. (6 stats, a skill list with a lot of crossover, etc.)

 

[SakanaSensei]

This comment is also very misleading, as some of the best looking ttrpg's were made in the 90's, many of which only had black & white art. Artists like Tim Bradstreet, RK Post, Clint Langley, and thousands of manga artists like Katsuya Terada would strongly disagree with you.

Black and white art has higher impact and greater detail than most color counterparts, and leaves no place to hide your mistakes. Some of the greatest (IMO) art in the world is black and white line art, just look at this example from the artist Katsuya Terada:

Absolutely gorgeous.

 

[Minigiant]

I don't really see the connection between successful kickstarters and wotc, I think you will have to clarify this so I can understand better what you are trying to say about them being correlated

Again WOTC does most of the advertising and marketing that brings in new TTRPGers. I don't think many companies can afford to push their RPGs in the mainstream for years.

This comment is also very misleading, as some of the best looking ttrpg's were made in the 90's, many of which only had black & white art. Artists like Tim Bradstreet, RK Post, Clint Langley, and thousands of manga artists like Katsuya Terada would strongly disagree with you.

Black and white art has higher impact and greater detail than most color counterparts, and leaves no place to hide your mistakes. Some of the greatest (IMO) art in the world is black and white line art, just look at this example from the artist Katsuya Terada:

I'm not saying black and white is bad.

I'm saying it's not 1997 and 5e isn't flooded with old school 1e and 2e fans.

Throwing away Hasbro means accepting a new situation and choosing your role in a different ecosystem. Because it won't be the same. It might be better for you. It might be worse. But it a chunk of the community makes a change, the ecosystem will change. It won't be the same.

 

[Micah Sweet]

We don't need them.

We just need someone or someones to inject tens of millions into the industry. And we need keep spending ourselves.

In fact, if we abandon Hasbro we need to spend more. Because no one else is prepared to takeover WOTC'S mantle and mega corps have the capitol and market trust to spend more egregiously.

Or else D&D and all other RPGs in its sphere contract back into its late 90s state.

The late 90s was my favorite time in gaming, to be honest. I see no need for a megacorp in the industry, unless I'm playing Cyberpunk.

 

[mamba]

MCDM just made i think 4 million? Did they rely on wotc or dnd at all for their kickstarter?

can they survive on 30k buyers, maybe 100k after the KS and drawing in more customers, probably (assuming they do manage to draw them in), but how many can manage this level of interest?

If you have no one drawing people to TTRPGs in general, I am not so sure we would have that many games or players as we do now

Shadowdark & Mothership made over a million this last year. This website has its own thread about million dollar kickstarters, many of them are games that have no connection to wotc or dnd.

and about 2/3 of them are for D&D…

 

[mamba]

I think the anger at WotC/Hasboro has made people look elsewhere for game and game systems. I have heard an awful lot of whistling past the graveyard after Ben Rigg's piece last week from people who make their money off of 5e, and being WotC-adjacent.

that is certainly one way to interpret the near-universal ‘you are wrong, Ben’ replies. I’d instead say they are probably correct and the sky is not falling