D&D 4E Green Ronin's Pramas blogs on 4e or not 4e

[Imaro]

Maybe...but when Pramas said "The jury's still out on whether the rules will be good," the impression that I get is:

"I wouldn't trust the likes of Baker, Bonner, Collins, Cordell, Heinsoo, Mearls, Noonan, Perkins, Radney-MacFarland, Schubert, Sims, Sernett, Thompson, or Wyatt to work on one of my products."

So Chris thinks his freelancers are better than these guys? Or perhaps he believes that it's the guiding hand of Green Ronin's editorial team that makes for good products. Because some of those "so-so" products you mention involved design work by guys that also do work for Green Ronin...like Robert Schwalb.

Questioning whether "everyone will like all the changes" is one thing, but questioning whether the rules will be "any good?" Like I said, if I was one of the WotC guys, I'd be insulted. And as a consumer, I think it's pretty arrogant.

If Green Ronin were so much better than WotC at giving gamers what they want, True 20 would be outselling Dungeons & Dragons. And it's not.

You are so reading something that is not there into this. How is basically saying...I want to know what I'm dishing out $5,000 for, equate to...You's guys make worse products than us guys? Everything WotC puts out hasn't been gold (or even copper for that matter) and 5K ain't pennies for Green Ronin. It's an investment, and like any investor, Chris is saying he wants to know what he's investing in before he gives up his money. I for one can only respect that.

 

[JohnSnow]

Right there is how flame wars start. Your taking this way out of context and putting words in someone's mouth. I wonder myself if the rules would be any good and if I want to support 4e. It has nothing to do with the designers or arrogance or any other such nonsense. Maybe 4e is just a game I don't like. Chris has always spoken highly of Wizards and their design team and I see nothing different here. He's being upfront and practical. Not a big deal at all.

Like I said, it was the questioning of whether the game would be "any good" that got to me.

I probably read too much into it. I'll go back through and edit my comments.

I apologize to Chris for reading too much into his post.

 

[The Little Raven]

Sales figures have a lot more to do with marketing than quality.

This is one of the worst arguments in the world, because it rejects any kind of objective metric (like, say, success) in place of a subjective measure (whether I like it or not). So, it allows someone to say that Titanic is crap, despite it outgrossing their favorite art-house film that only six people ever saw, but allows them to defend accusations that their art-house film was crap because "well, sales doesn't equal quality."

 

[Voadam]

Maybe...but when Pramas said "The jury's still out on whether the rules will be good," the impression that I get is:

"I wouldn't trust the likes of Baker, Bonner, Collins, Cordell, Heinsoo, Mearls, Noonan, Perkins, Radney-MacFarland, Schubert, Sims, Sernett, Thompson, or Wyatt to work on one of my products."

So Chris thinks his freelancers are better than these guys? Or perhaps he believes that it's the guiding hand of Green Ronin's editorial team that makes for good products. Because some of those "so-so" products you mention involved design work by guys that also do work for Green Ronin...like Robert Schwalb.

Questioning whether "everyone will like all the changes" is one thing, but questioning whether the rules will be "any good?" Like I said, if I was one of the WotC guys, I'd be insulted. And as a consumer, I think it's pretty arrogant.

If Green Ronin were so much better than WotC at giving gamers what they want, True 20 would be outselling Dungeons & Dragons. And it's not.

1) The new rules need to be good.

Jury is still out on this. More to the point, I can't find out if they are good any time soon unless I'm willing to shell out $5,000 to get early access. That's a big leap of faith.

The impression I get is that he considers the quality of the rules are still an unknown quantity.

Doesn't come off as arrogant to me. I agree with him.

 

[BryonD]

Questioning whether "everyone will like all the changes" is one thing, but questioning whether the rules will be "any good?" Like I said, if I was one of the WotC guys, I'd be insulted. And as a consumer, I think it's pretty arrogant.

Another funny thing, I've kinda felt that way about all the comments being slung toward 3.5 now. Why is it ok to flat out slam the 3.5 rules most of these same people contributed to and yet not ok to simply leave the door open on an up or down for 4e?

Next time someone starts saying something negative about a 3.5 rule, will you come riding to the defense of these very same developers? Is it arrogant and insulting to question whether a 3.5 rule is "any good"?

 

[BryonD]

The impression I get is that he considers the quality of the rules are still an unknown quantity.

Doesn't come off as arrogant to me. I agree with him.

Exactly

 

[JohnSnow]

The impression I get is that he considers the quality of the rules are still an unknown quantity.

Doesn't come off as arrogant to me. I agree with him.

What's "quality" though?

If you like them, they're "good," and if you don't, they're "bad?" I don't think it's that simple.

I think it may be an open question as to how popular the 4E rules will be. On the other hand, I have faith in the designers at WotC to do a good job. I've seen nothing to suggest they're doing anything "wrong" other than to shed legacy things I didn't think were particularly essential to the game in the first place.

I don't think the game is "good" because they're getting rid of that stuff. However, some people seem to think the game is going to be "bad" because of it, as opposed to just "not what they'd prefer." The quality of a game is very subjective. Personally, I think the game is going to be "good" because the designers at WotC are people familiar with D&D trying to make the best game they know how to.

In the process, they may lose some people. Because what's non-essential to them (or me) may be someone else's "sacred cow." For example, if you really loved the way magic worked in previous editions and can't stand the changes, then 4E isn't going to be the game for you. However, that doesn't make it, objectively speaking, a "bad" game or even "not good."

Does that make any sense?

 

[Uzzy]

One bit of confusion based on Chris' post above though: Hasn't WotC said that they'll let Phase 1 folks read the rules before committing the $5,000. In other words, sign the NDA, read the rules, and if they stink we won't hold you to the whole $5,000 thing?

I thought it was something closer to 'Sign NDA, read the OGL, then if you're interested, pay $5,000 and see the Rules'?

Anyway, all Mr Pramas seems to be saying is that we don't know if the Rules will be any good. Are WoTC a professional company, with professionals making their product? Sure they are. I'm sure Coca Cola thought the same when they made New Coke. It didn't work out too well. There are plenty of 3rd/3.5 Edition WoTC that were poorer then others.

Besides, what actual rules have we seen for 4th Edition so far? We've seen some fluff, a few stat blocks and plenty of designers saying these rules will be great/cool, but no real evidence to back that up. Green Ronin seem to be in a position where they can see if the rules for 4th Edition are good for $5,000. That is, as Mr Pramas says, a big leap of faith, particularly for a company that has other things going for it and in development right now. $5,000 could mean budget cuts for the ASoIaF RPG, or a delay for the next True 20 book etc. It's an unenviable decision.

I certainly don't see Mr Pramas being supremely arrogant. I think that's unfair.

As for a measure of quality, we only really have time. Even then, it's a bit dodgy, but you can understand why things like Homer's Iliad are still important in today's literary world. In 4th Edition's case, well, we can only see if those rules are good for us when they come out in July.

 

[Darrin Drader]

This is one of the worst arguments in the world, because it rejects any kind of objective metric (like, say, success) in place of a subjective measure (whether I like it or not). So, it allows someone to say that Titanic is crap, despite it outgrossing their favorite art-house film that only six people ever saw, but allows them to defend accusations that their art-house film was crap because "well, sales doesn't equal quality."

It's good to see that there are still people out there who cling to idealism while the rest of us have become jaded by experience. Keep fighting the good fight!

 

[JohnSnow]

I certainly don't see Mr Pramas being supremely arrogant. I think that's unfair.

Yes, it probably is. As I've admitted. I'd delete the post, but then half the posts in this thread wouldn't make sense. So I've left it.

I admit that I over-reacted. However, I still think the blog came across more negatively than Chris probably intended.

That said, I've apologized for it several times and would like to move on. I'm happy to discuss my later comments, but I'd like to leave the "supremely arrogant" comment behind with a "mea culpa" and my apology to Chris for taking his blog comments in the worst possible way.