Earlier Then Planned?

[Scribble]

Does anyone ever get the feeling 4e was announced slightly earlier then planned?

First off, the whole I thought Wizards said they wouldn't be announcing anything until D&D Experience...

Then the fact that a lot of the stuff still seems like it needs a little work... Like Dragon and Dungeon, Gleemax... D&D Insider... All of it supposedly still "coming on line."

Plus, when I watched the announcement seminar, the whole thing seemed kind of rushed... But that could be because they used D&D geeks to announce it and not public speakers.

Still though... I kind of get the feeling they planned to announce it later, but then someone said, lets just do it and get it over with.

Shrug. Not that it really matters, or I'm upset with WOTC or some silliness like that. Just currious.

 

[WhatGravitas]

Still though... I kind of get the feeling they planned to announce it later, but then someone said, lets just do it and get it over with.

Hmmm... announcing it later? Hardly possible, due to the long times for distributors. The amazon-entry would have gone up now, regardless of announcement, so we would know by now, regardless of their announcement.

Cheers, LT.

 

[WayneLigon]

First off, the whole I thought Wizards said they wouldn't be announcing anything until D&D Experience...

I never really put too much stock in that. GenCon is the big convention for RPGs. It only makes sense to make your biggest announcements there if at all possible.

 

[Aloïsius]

IMHO, 4e should have wait at least 6 more months before beeing released. Why ? Because Starwars saga was somewhat too young for extracting quintessential feedback. But I guess the publication rush of the last few years made it impossible : MM5 and PHB2 show clearly that they needed a new edition.

I'm quite sure I will wait somewhat before buying 4e, probably until the first revision (no, not 4.5 ! Just the second printing, with a lot of errata). Anyway, my 3.5 campaign are planed to last until 2009 so...

 

[BBQ]

Well, there's this whole group of guys who work at WotC called "marketing". If they figured it was a wise decision to announce 4e when they did, then that's their call. It's not like the videos and announcements at GenCon were suddenly conjured up out of nowhere. This was a decision made probably months in advance.

 

[Scribble]

Well, there's this whole group of guys who work at WotC called "marketing". If they figured it was a wise decision to announce 4e when they did, then that's their call. It's not like the videos and announcements at GenCon were suddenly conjured up out of nowhere. This was a decision made probably months in advance.

Well I'm not saying like Gencon was the next day and someone said... hey you know what... lets announce 4e!!!

More along the lines of any corporate entity...

Originally they plan for the announcement/unvailing to be later in the year... Everyone works on their stuff based on that date... Then someone from the upper eschelons says: Lets do it a few months ahead of schedule.. We can do it, people will just have to work a little harder.

Stuff like that happened when I wrked in the corporate environment all the time.

One groups looking at the project the other the numbers and the yearly report.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I'll probably like 4e, but I keep getting the feeling it isn't being playtested long enough. The WotC employees mention "we're trying this new thing now" in their blogs, but aren't they "locking up" the PH 4e so they can't make any significant changes now? It could be just a wrong impression.

I always got the impression that 3.0 and 3.5 were both rushed (the first to save DnD, the second due to market forces). I think 4e might be a bit rushed for the same reason as 3.5. However, I'm liking what I'm hearing about it.

 

[Scribble]

I'll probably like 4e, but I keep getting the feeling it isn't being playtested long enough. The WotC employees mention "we're trying this new thing now" in their blogs, but aren't they "locking up" the PH 4e so they can't make any significant changes now? It could be just a wrong impression.

I always got the impression that 3.0 and 3.5 were both rushed (the first to save DnD, the second due to market forces). I think 4e might be a bit rushed for the same reason as 3.5. However, I'm liking what I'm hearing about it.

So am I. A lot of the changes make a lot of sense to me. It just perked my curiosity thinking about it. It just seemed like the classic corporate: "Hey the boss just announced he thinks we're ready to release the new project a month early..." moment.

Whenever it happened to us when I worked corporate, for the most part the project was done, but all the fine tuning stuff and beautification stuff was rushed as everyone clamored to get their projects done for the new deadline... (IE everyone stopped doing their normal slacking off, and worked a lot. )

 

[WhatGravitas]

I'll probably like 4e, but I keep getting the feeling it isn't being playtested long enough. The WotC employees mention "we're trying this new thing now" in their blogs, but aren't they "locking up" the PH 4e so they can't make any significant changes now? It could be just a wrong impression.

Well, don't forget that being a gearhead is a designers' disease - they're always trying new things. And that's good - if playtest shows something as totally out of whack, they still have several iterations of the rule to use.

Cheers, LT.

 

[ivocaliban]

I don't know if they planned on making the announcement earlier or if they just weren't quite ready when it came time to make the announcement. There is a distinction to be made, I feel. While I agree with others that they couldn't have waited much longer to make the annoucement (thus it wasn't earlier than planned), they certainly didn't seem in a comfortable position to do so. I have the feeling that WotC is a rather stressful place to work at the moment (good thing they've had all that playtesting to blow off some steam).

It did upset me that WotC made the announcement around the same time as the release of products like their own Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk and Mongoose's Conan The Roleplaying Game 2nd Edtion (man, I feel sorry for those guys...releasing a revamped line of 3.5e Conan within weeks of the 4E announcement), they had to get the PR machine started if they wanted a spring '08 launch.