[EDITION WARZ] Selling Out D&D's Soul?

[Raven Crowking]

There is a slight problem with that. At some point, if a product is consistently selling better than all other products, it might just be a better product. A Toyota Corolla was the number one selling car in North America for 10 years (and possibly a little more). That does point to a confluence of factors which makes it a better car. Or at least a car which appeals to the most number of people.

All it points to is one of several possibilities:

(1) A better car,
(2) A better marketing stategy,
(3) A cheaper car where the things that make another car better are considered extraneous, or the market cannot bear the cost of a better car,
(4) A market that is not informed about, or does not care about, which car is actually best (this actually ties into 2 & 3),
(5) The car not directly competing with another, superior, car, because that car is no longer being made.

I am sure there are more possibilities, but those are the ones that come to the top of my head. Market forces tend to lead to the lowest common denominator. There is an economic theory, for example, that says that if you can make the best cars in the world, or inferior snow shovels, that you should make whichever will create the greatest profit, regardless of quality. Moreover, you can sell those inferior snow shovels to people who can make better ones if it is cheaper for them to buy yours than it is to make better ones themselves. Meanwhile, you're left buying the lousy cars made by the guys who can make better snow shovels, but instead buy yours. Obviously, you might also be able to make a bundle by selling specialty, luxury items, but you will sell fewer of these and you will have to sell them at a higher price point.

Archaeological data suggests that the above market force effect occurred consistently even in prehistoric cultures.

This is different, btw, from saying that streamlining the rules is an indication of pandering to the LCD. It is simply a statement that says that market forces have very little to do with how good a product actually is. This is true when pointing to 1e sales figures, too. That a 1e module greatly outsold every 3e module to date doesn't mean that the 1e module was better than the 3e modules. Sales figures simply do not allow us to draw this sort of conclusion.

I detest elitist attitudes which state that any sort of streamlining of the rules equates with "dumbing down" or pandering to the lowest common denominator. Sure, streamlining the rules makes them easier to understand, which means that more people can understand them, but, why is that remotely a bad thing?

Allow me to state here and now that the 3.X rules are not complicated enough for my personal tastes. I have actually gone to the effort of complicating them! Or, to be fairer, some parts of the rules were over-complicated (which I streamlined) while other parts were under-complicated (which I beefed up).

"Streamlining" itself is, almost by definition in this context, "dumbing down". It is arguable whether or not this is a good or bad thing in almost any case. The real determinant, IMHO, is whether or not the streamlined rules can do everything that the un-streamlined rules were able to do.

Pandering to the lowest common denominator, however, has more to do with attitude, IMHO. The idea that players need something every level, that rust monsters are "too hard", that complexity = not fun, that failure or the potential for real failure = not fun, that the rules have to fall into the best intrepation for the players, that the DM should just say Yes, that restrictions for flavour = bad DM, pander to the lowest common denominator. These are not ideas inherent in the ruleset, although there are a lot of things WotC is doing, IMHO, that promote these sorts of ideas.

When I DM, I assume that the players have an attention span. I assume that they are capable of acting maturely. I assume that they are willing to take responsibility for their choices, and for the consequences thereof. I assume that they want to face real challenges, with a real chance of failure and a real chance of success. I assume that they do not want me to fudge die rolls, and in turn will play fairly themselves. In short, I assume that they will act as adults (even when they are not).

Many of the articles I have read on the WotC site make me believe that the authors do not believe the same things.

Pandering to the lowest common denominator increases sales. Pure and simple. It is why McDonalds has over 40 billion sold, why dollar stores spring up like weeds, why most of the shows on TV suck, and why we get sound bites instead of in-depth news analysis. There is a market for gourmet food, better merchandise, good television, and actual coverage, but it is a much smaller market.

Again, the d20 System offers a great ruleset to build a game from. It requires tweaking if you really want to make it your own, but that is true for all rulesets. It does things, IMHO, that neither 1e or 2e did well, and I can tweak what I liked from 1e and 2e back into it.

But please do not point to sales figures as evidence of greatness. McDonalds may sell more burgers than Licks, but I know which one tastes better.



RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

I agree with this and, in fact, anecdotally I have at least one friend who did exactly that. But I am also interested in Wizards getting credit where credit is due. For one they hired designers who, it seems to me, were more than up to the task of creating a new edition of the game. They pumped real money into a design and playtesting process that created a rock-solid 3rd Edition with only a few wrinkles. They (bravely/selfishly in equal measure I guess) created a framework for the d20/D&D brand to explode with the SRD. IMO Wizards did everything they could to ensure the brand was rejuvenated.

The SRD is the single greatest contribution to the rpg community since the game was first created. I doubt, were it not for the SRD, and the excellent 3rd party options that it made possible, that I would have bought into the current edition.


RC

 

[Lanefan]

Allow me to state here and now that the 3.X rules are not complicated enough for my personal tastes. I have actually gone to the effort of complicating them! Or, to be fairer, some parts of the rules were over-complicated (which I streamlined) while other parts were under-complicated (which I beefed up).

"Streamlining" itself is, almost by definition in this context, "dumbing down". It is arguable whether or not this is a good or bad thing in almost any case. The real determinant, IMHO, is whether or not the streamlined rules can do everything that the un-streamlined rules were able to do.

Pandering to the lowest common denominator, however, has more to do with attitude, IMHO. The idea that players need something every level, that rust monsters are "too hard", that complexity = not fun, that failure or the potential for real failure = not fun, that the rules have to fall into the best intrepation for the players, that the DM should just say Yes, that restrictions for flavour = bad DM, pander to the lowest common denominator. These are not ideas inherent in the ruleset, although there are a lot of things WotC is doing, IMHO, that promote these sorts of ideas.

When I DM, I assume that the players have an attention span. I assume that they are capable of acting maturely. I assume that they are willing to take responsibility for their choices, and for the consequences thereof. I assume that they want to face real challenges, with a real chance of failure and a real chance of success. I assume that they do not want me to fudge die rolls, and in turn will play fairly themselves. In short, I assume that they will act as adults (even when they are not).

Well said!

There's one more mindset you missed, though: "if WotC or some key individual within WotC says it, it becomes canon to the game". In one's own gaming group, it's possible to counter this - sometimes with effort - but overall the direction they set is going to be somewhat by default the direction the game slowly goes.

Lanefan

 

[Raven Crowking]

Well said!

Thank you. I'm surprised that no one's told me how off-base and wrong I am yet.

There's one more mindset you missed, though: "if WotC or some key individual within WotC says it, it becomes canon to the game". In one's own gaming group, it's possible to counter this - sometimes with effort - but overall the direction they set is going to be somewhat by default the direction the game slowly goes.

Yeah, but that's true for all editions of all rpgs, isn't it? I mean, what TSR did in the old days was often considered "official" by the same type of players.

What I would love to see more of in Dragon, really, are "how to" articles. It seems to me that too many of these young whippersnappers don't feel they can (or know how to) alter the rules, or use the rules to create something that is uniquely theirs. Those were the articles I loved from the old magazine!

 

[Thurbane]

Yeah, but that's true for all editions of all rpgs, isn't it? I mean, what TSR did in the old days was often considered "official" by the same type of players.

That is true, but I am seeing more and more instances of almost religious fanatacism in worship of the almighty RAW, and an underlying "sense of entitlement" that anything added by WotC is canon and MUST be allowed in all games. Also, an underlying current that adjusting the RAW for your own game is fundmantally wrong, since the RAW is so infallible that any changes to it must inherently be wrong.

I don't primarily blame the current ruleset for this trend, though...

 

[Lanefan]

What I would love to see more of in Dragon, really, are "how to" articles. It seems to me that too many of these young whippersnappers don't feel they can (or know how to) alter the rules, or use the rules to create something that is uniquely theirs. Those were the articles I loved from the old magazine!

Many of those old Drag-Mag's had articles that in effect *did* alter the rules in one way or another; some of those suggested alterations wound up as Unearthed Arcana, for better or worse...the fun part was watching the game in effect develop before our eyes. And of course, the feeling was that if they could alter the game, *we* could alter the game...

Lanefan

 

[Ranes]

...Yet, I can say that I've known a truckload of GMs who thought ill of a game (not necessarily D&D, but often) and actually brought what they hated to the game table when they ran it, regarless of the qualities or flaws of the game itself.

So if I may paraphrase, it's not the rules you bring to the game, it's the game you bring to the rules.

If that's not twisting your meaning, I can only say, "Amen."

Lanefan: that's a good point. 3.x is inclusive of what players have brought to previous editions. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that not just UA but all of 3.x is the summation of that process. Warts and all. Look at it this way: if I met somebody who said to me, "I've been playing OD&D since day one. I've written a whole host of my own rules to accommodate the game that's grown out of that. Why should I buy 3.x anything?"

I'd say, "No reason at all. Any room in your group?"

 

[Thurbane]

I'd say, "No reason at all. Any room in your group?"

Testify!

 

[Hussar]

That is true, but I am seeing more and more instances of almost religious fanatacism in worship of the almighty RAW, and an underlying "sense of entitlement" that anything added by WotC is canon and MUST be allowed in all games. Also, an underlying current that adjusting the RAW for your own game is fundmantally wrong, since the RAW is so infallible that any changes to it must inherently be wrong.

See, now I think this is just a reason to stop paying too much attention to web boards.

We've already driven some pretty deep stakes into the idea of player entitlement. When RC asked if he as DM should nix the idea of a character that didn't fit into his campaign, the overwhelming response was "No problem". When I asked how many people had actually seen, in person, a player with this attitude, virtually no one had.

Of the around 50 gamers I've dealt with over OpenRPG in the past three years, only one came even close to what you are saying.

Pandering to the lowest common denominator, however, has more to do with attitude, IMHO. The idea that players need something every level, that rust monsters are "too hard", that complexity = not fun, that failure or the potential for real failure = not fun, that the rules have to fall into the best intrepation for the players, that the DM should just say Yes, that restrictions for flavour = bad DM, pander to the lowest common denominator. These are not ideas inherent in the ruleset, although there are a lot of things WotC is doing, IMHO, that promote these sorts of ideas.

Ok, reading too much into a throwaway article on the WOTC board of how someone would design a monster and then taking that for policy is a bit much. Never mind that in the mind of a very large number of people, many of whom are long time gamers, he was right. "Gotcha" creatures are one of the poorest examples of design there is. Why waste a page in the Monster Manual, when you can do the EXACT same thing in a paragraph in the traps section of the DMG? It's not a case of pandering, or that the creature was "too hard", it was that the creature as written is not terribly well designed.

Players need something every level. Well, that's always been in the game as well. At least for casters. Pretty much most classes got some sort of bennie nearly every level in every edition of the game. Why is this suddenly a shock to people?

To me, it's more a case of the design of the game being more transparent. You mention needing more "how to" type articles in Dragon. Note, that sort of thing has been funneled into Dungeon now, but that's beside the point. Why? If the design of the game is more transparent, if we actually know the reasoning behind why the fighter gets a feat every other level, then do we really need hand holding to create new stuff?

Way back, I mentioned creating specialty priests. The problem there was that almost no guidance was given beyond some very vague points. In addition, there was nothing to be found anywhere about WHY a cleric gets what he does. The DM had to figure it out entirely by himself. Now, with a bazillion websites out there, including WOTC's and EN World's, we can talk directly with the designers and pick their brains. We can read Monte Cook's blog and learn. Or Eric Mona's. Or a number of others.

3e has become the most transparent game of the three editions. We have guidelines (NOT RULES) for wealth, encounter design, monster design, etc. We have a wealth of resources available for the game that simply weren't there for earlier editions. I think this is why a lot of people get turned off. They suddenly realize that they aren't unique snowflakes and maybe, just maybe, the ideas they have aren't quite as good as they thought they were.

Speaking entirely for myself, my DMing has improved more in the past four or five years than in the past twenty simply because I feel that I have a ruleset that I can rely on and because I have such a wealth of information to choose from. Note the "I feel" in that statement. YMMV and all that.

 

[Thurbane]

See, now I think this is just a reason to stop paying too much attention to web boards.

I see your point, but I still don't believe that the number of such postings I have seen can be totally unrepresentative of at least a percentage of gamers out there.