d20Dwarf said:
What specifically makes you hate Dragon?
Please do not simply say the content is poor or not useful, be specific.
Again, leading the witness there, but I'll bite. I don't hate Dragon - I hate some of the stuff in it.
Here are examples of content I find poor and not useful:
1.) Fiction for fiction's sake (i.e., no relevant D&D tie-ins). If I want fiction, I will pick up a fiction magazine or go to the book section. If you do a piece of fiction that is RELEVANT to specific D&D content in Dragon (e.g., the article on "my life with a steel dragon" from I think it was Dragon Annual 5 that then covered some of the game mechanical effects relative to the steel dragon), that's okay. But "Bob's Trip in the Forgotten Realms" is NOT fiction relevant to D&D just because it happens to be set in Faerun. Hope the distinction is clear.
2.) This makes certain things get "double negative points", but profanity. I stand by the statement, "profanity is the effort of a feeble mind to express itself forcibly." The prevailing argument towards including it has been along the lines of, (a) you shouldn't be offended, and (b) it works in fiction to help "set the tone." Well, if you eliminate fiction (gripe number one), you don't have argument (b) to fall back on... and I would suggest that Dragon needs to be "non-family-threatening" (I'll change the term from "family-friendly" - it doesn't have to bend over backwards to please them, but neither should it come out and offend them either). Why?
Well, I took an informal poll here to see when people started gaming -
http://enworld.cyberstreet.com/poll.php?action=showresults&pollid=1286 - and for all the statistical flaws the sample might exhibit, it tells me that at least one "study" finds that (as of this writing) upwards of 60% of gamers were introduced to gaming at age 12 or younger, and over 85% were introduced to gaming at age 15 or younger. My conclusion? Most of the "new blood" in the hobby comes from "young" folks - and to make material that is not intended for them pretty much cuts off the influx of new blood.
Yes, gamers today are, on average, older than they were at any other period in RPG history. But it would be supremely selfish of us to "pull the ladder up" behind us by deliberately focusing on stuff that is not appropriate for those under at least the age of 15 (and I would suggest 12). Yes we like our game, but are we now going to demand that nobody else be allowed to be introduced to it as we were by consciously excluding those who are "too young" for us? What if D&D had been "for mature adults only" when YOU "found it?" Would you have found it at all? Odds are, NO.
3.) Product Tie-In Issues - Suffice to say I don't need to see Dragon's "Theme" schedule mirroring WotC's release schedule. I didn't need a "vile" issue to coincide with the Book of Vile Darkness. I didn't need a "drow" issue to coincide with The Queen of the Demonweb Pits. I didn't need a "Strongholds" issue to coincide with the Stronghold Builder's Guidebook. The "extra" material for these books that gets published in Dragon belongs on WotC's site as a "free web supplement" and not in a magazine I am paying for.
4.) Most of the Editorial columns - especially the snottiness exhibited in the responses to scale mail (granted, the letters they were responding to were pretty snotty, but the old adage, "never argue with a fool - it's tough for people to tell the difference" applies here - Dragon's Editors may be nice people and well-thought and well-spoken people, but you'd never know it by reading their responses to the Scale Mail).
5.) Reams of pages of advertisements. This one is, I know, unrealistic. Without making a scientific study by cutting up a magazine into "ads" and "not ads," my gut feel is that there is about a 2:1 noise (read: ads) to signal (read: content) ratio. And when so much of the content puts me off, the signal:noise ratio gets even worse.
6.) Anything to do with the Realms that is not "generic D&D crunch" - Magic of Faerun "good." Elminster's Ecologies "good." Why? Because it's all really just generic D&D except some of the proper names of people and locations. The Politics of Cormyr after the Death of Azoun "bad." If I don't play in the Realms, this is WORTHLESS to me. Heck, even if I DO play in the Realms, if I don't play in Cormyr (given the vast area of the Realms, more likely than not), it's WORTHLESS. Settings should be used as a source for names and
nothing more if you want generic D&D material (which I do). I don't mind the Realms being "spice" on the content - but not the "whole meal," if that makes sense.
7.) "Ad Copy" on the Cover - This is Dragon Freaking Magazine. You have the market cornered. You're not Cosmo, which is competing with Redbook, which is competing with Woman's Day, which is competing with goodness only knows what else and therefore needs the most scandalous headlines possible (why do they tell you the "12 secrets to great sex" EVERY month? Or are these DIFFERENT secrets? Who knows...). You don't need salacious "headlines" on the cover. Just "Dragon" will do nicely.
What would you like to see in Dragon?
1.) First and foremost, the Open Game License, complete with a designation of Open Game Content - most especially declaring as open all of the "crunch" printed therein. I know, that's a pipe dream too.
2.) Ecology of... - There are hundreds of monsters out there that could use this. Now, while you may not use a specific monster in your campaign, I think it helps you at least figure out how the monster fits and how you MIGHT use it in your campaign.
3.) New Spells - More variations on a theme is good.
4.) More "play aids" - the Spell Effect patterns are good. The "miniatures" are good - provided they are limited to a page or two (for those who don't use minis).
5.) "Research into World-Building" - By which I mean things like Gygax' "World Builder" book and AEG's "Toolbox" - but with stuff explored in more depth and illustrated. I for one would love to see WotC provide "five new pieces of jewelry, illustrated and statted, and given a generic history" per month or something. Give us "100 random tavern menus" (10 "desert nomad" menus, 10 "western european" menus, etc.) or whatever - all the "little things" that none of have time to do but that add lots of flavor. Also includes things like Dungeoncraft.
6.) More articles to explain the thinking (and mathematics) behind the rules of the game - i.e,. the rules for making rules (think "How to Design a Feat/Monster/Prestige Class").
7.) "Conversion" articles - I loved the article on how to do a "game balanced" import of thrown destructive potions from Gauntlet into D&D. Not necessarily for the potions themselves, but by someone saying, "here's this cool effect you've seen that isn't covered by the standard D&D rules. Here's the thought process needed to 'import' the idea into D&D rules."
8.) Templates - We need more of these, simply because they're so great for throwing off players' expectations! After all, the PCs may know what to do when they face a troll, but what about a troll native to the elemental plane of fire?
9.) Speaking of the planes, let's go through and re-visit them in all their 3e glory. I still remember articles on Gehenna and Hades and the Twin Paradises in older Dragon articles. Let's update them!
10.) New Rules: We still need a comprehensive set of 3e rules for Mass Combat, Ruling Dominions, Underwater and Airborne Adventuring, and a dozen other things I can't think of.
11.) Product Reviews: And NOT just of "friends of WotC" like we see announced on the WotC d20 site.
They should be bringing us a cross-section of products, big and small, from big and small publishers, across the d20 world. Now that Dragon is (in theory) being published by a third-party company, and not WotC, they should not be such a blatant product pusher for WotC at the expense of others.
12.) A written apology to all of the readers whom they have offended (see mostly their snotty responses in the Scale Mail above). A little humility and admitting, "we misjudged it, we were wrong, we're sorry" will go a long way (I have never seen all three of those put together by them, BTW - I have seen "we misjudged it but we are not sorry" and that's not good enough for me). Probably a pipe dream.
13.) A return of a "morality" clause in the Submissions Guidelines for Dragon - including the "internal" submissions guidelines (didn't see one in their new external guidelines) - this goes along with "don't be family-hostile." Again, this is probably a pipe dream.
14.) More expansion of "what skills can do" - the most neglected part of 3e, IMO. The "Better Living Through Alchemy" article was terrific.
15.) A lower article-to-ad ratio. Also, less "graphics" cluttering up the "text" of articles. I know Dragon feels it has to look like a "state of the art" magazine. Most gamers seem to want state of the art CONTENT and are not quite as concerned with LAYOUT as readers of other magazines.
I personally like the Wizards Workshop sections the most, though many of the others are cool. Do you allow new game mechanics and rules bits from Dragon into your game? Would articles every month with new spells, monsters, and settings make you happy? Would Dragon then be nothing but a D&D sourcebook with advertising and comics?
After review, sometimes. Yes. Yes - and is that a BAD thing? (I don't think so).
One of the appealing things about writing an article is that you can explore some aspect of the game without having to go into ad nauseum detail about it as you would in a large sourcebook.
Precisely. I want Dragon to give me multiple mini-sourcebooks every month.
So please give me your idea of the perfect Dragon magazine, what contents it would have each month, and why you think your idea as a whole is better than the current format.
Why is my idea as a whole better than the current format? Because it's the Dragon Magazine *I* want.
Seriously, I think it's better because it has the widest appeal possible (you can appeal to kids without turning off the "mature" - but it's tough to appeal to the "mature" without turning off kids) and keeps the magazine tightly in focus (on
d20/D&D, not FR, not fiction, not anything else). Dragon needs to get focused - it's too schizophrenic right now.
IMO. YMMV.
--The Sigil
