Hasbro CEO: "D&D is Really on a Tear"

Sorry, that laugh was a result of clumsy fingers on my phone.

 

[Grainger]

Board game badwrongfun snobbery?

I've had alot of fun with those games, especially with my kids. :shrug:

Of course you can have fun with them, and it's great that you're spending quality time with your kids (as a gaming parent, I'm delighted to be raising a gamer). But have you tried well-regarded modern games? You'll probably have even more fun. They tend to be much better, and don't (unlike, say Risk or Monopoly) drag on for hours beyond their welcome.

For example, a great silly game to play with kids (or friends), to pick just one out of thousands of fantastic choices:

http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/97903/terror-meeple-city

Anyway, this is off-topic, so I'm not going to derail the thread any more. In my defence, board game fans feel as strongly about their hobby as RPG fans do!

 

[Trickster Spirit]

I'm aware that they do very good business (here in the UK most of them dominate the board games market), but as a board gamer, I can tell you that as games, it sucks that they're still the top sellers. They range from (arguably) passable to truly terrible designs. Modern board games moved past them eons ago, and continue to come out with dozens of exciting, innovative designs every year, providing the same good aspects of these games (e.g. trading, acquisition, conflict) but making them into easier to play experiences with more depth, and much better components. The aforementioned "classics" may have stood the test of time, but largely because people aren't aware that much better designs exist (it's easier for Hasbro to market the same old titles that everyone already knows), and 90% of their billion copies sit unplayed gathering dust in cupboards except at Christmas where they're pulled out to give board games a bad name yet again.

It is astonishing how closely this parallels a lot of RPG gamers' complaints about D&D itself.

 

[Grainger]

It is astonishing how closely this parallels a lot of RPG gamers' complaints about D&D itself.

Well, maybe, but D&D 5e is actually a good game when compared to other modern games of the same type. But sure, I guess indie RPG fans probably feel similarly about it. I guess the main thing is to try what's out there and decide what you like.

 

[doctorhook]

My hope is that what we're seeing is WotC taking a (probably wisely) conservative approach that will gradually expand outward as they establish a solid beach-head of popularity and stability. I have a hard time imagining that they won't gradually roll out more products. Probably (and hopefully) nothing like we've seen from 2E to 4E, but certainly more than the two story arcs a year approach.

I agree. My point lately has been that I really believe WotC would be releasing more books right now if they had the budget to develop them, and more fundamentally, if they thought those books would be suitably profitable. We know that 4E was ultimately not great for the brand, and I definitely feel that WotC has not been in a gambling mood with regards to 5E's release schedule; we got a starter set (cheap but with a strong adventure), three core books (top notch quality overall), then two outsourced adventure paths, and currently silence about what's next. In the past, we always new about some other book coming down the pipe within six months, and while I'm sure stuff currently is under development, the fact that they no longer want to announce their plans suggests they don't want to make any commitments until profitability is assured. (Obviously books are a diminishing and TTRPGing is a diminishing hobby, but IMO there's still more demand for new D&D books than they appear to be capitalizing upon for now.)

And a conservative release schedule being *wise* is entirely the point. There is a LOT of time to release books, as we haven't even reached the end of Year One yet.

Here was the release schedule for 4E:

In June '08 they released Player's Handbook 1, Dungeon Master's Guide 1, and Monster Manual 1. Nine months later they released Player's Handbook 2. Two months after that, they release Monster Manual 2. So at the end of Year One for 4th edition... they had already blown through the release of 5 core books. DMG 2 was released in September '09. Player's Handbook 3 was released in March '10. And Monster Manual 3 was released in June of '10.

So in two years time in the life cycle of 4E... they had already blown through EIGHT different core rule books. In TWO YEARS. And this doesn't even include the five Powers books published in and around them all. You want to know why 4E's life cycle was so short? THAT'S the reason right there. There was nothing worthwhile left to publish except a soft reboot with Essentials.

Man, you forgot a whole bunch of stuff just in the first six months of 4E: Adventurer's Vault, Open Grave, Draconomicon 1, and Manual of the Planes, plus two Forgotten Realms hardcovers, not to mention four 96-page adventures, all before the end of 2008. (Honestly, I'm not even sure that I'm not forgetting about some books.) Like you pointed out, 4E was released in June of that year.

I definitely do not advocate a return to this level of output, but to me it does feel like 5E has left us hanging.

Right now, we have no idea if 5E will see this same amount of support. My guess is when we look back on 5E from a decade or so in the future, it might end up getting up there. The only difference being those eight core books (or publications on par with those kinds of books) are going to be spread out over Years One through Five, rather than entirely crammed into Years One and Two. And yeah... that's annoying players who like a fast publication cycle because they now have nothing to read and instead are just stuck playing the game instead... but from everything we've heard from the Powers That Be... that's the new paradigm for this newest edition and we all just gotta accept it.

But I do find it funny hearing the myriad of people who keep spouting here on the boards that if WotC doesn't publish faster that the game is going to die on the vine... cause I think it was proven quite conclusively that doing it the other way during 4E didn't work either. And I would suspect that the men and women in the D&D department of Wizards also know this.

I think you're oversimplifying here. 4E was a failure because of a bunch of factors, and their release schedule was only one part of that. Many of us want to buy more products exactly because we're enjoying 5E as much as we are (and in a couple cases, because it feels like certain options were not given the same breadth of development that others were). If we're standing here with our wallets open, what's wrong with asking for more?

 

[doctorhook]

Chop out every hardcover book outside the Core and Bestiary, and I'm with you. As it is, the PFSRD is a complete glut of content printed just because.

This is basically what kept me from ever getting into PF: it had all the problems of 3E (including the bloat), but newer, more often, and more expensive. I didn't find that compelling.

 

[Wicht]

I'm aware that they do very good business (here in the UK most of them dominate the board games market), but as a board gamer, I can tell you that as games, it sucks that they're still the top sellers. They range from (arguably) passable to truly terrible designs. Modern board games moved past them eons ago, and continue to come out with dozens of exciting, innovative designs every year, providing the same good aspects of these games (e.g. trading, acquisition, conflict) but making them into easier to play experiences with more depth, and much better components. The aforementioned "classics" may have stood the test of time, but largely because people aren't aware that much better designs exist (it's easier for Hasbro to market the same old titles that everyone already knows), and 90% of their billion copies sit unplayed gathering dust in cupboards except at Christmas where they're pulled out to give board games a bad name yet again.

Eh, as a pretty avid gamer I have to both agree with you and disagree with you. I do think there are games (many, many games), which offer better overall experiences. But of the ones listed, really only "Life" is what I would call a truly bad design (Candy Land, if meant for anyone older than 4 is also bad, but as its actually meant for four year olds, its fine for what it is - a random race game which teaches colors). The others are actually decent for what they are.

There are plenty of mass-market games that come and go, but the evergreen are evergreen for a reason. Firstly, they are generally very easy to learn. That right there is a huge plus. Sure Risk devolves easily into a lopsided game, but you can learn it in about 5 minutes, which for a war game is pretty good. Clue is subject to roll and move, but other than that, as a deduction game it's solid. Scrabble in particular is hard to beat, imo for what it does, though I think Word on the Street might come really close to having higher mass-market appeal. Even Monopoly, so often derided, if (huge caveat) you play it as actually written (stop putting money in Free Parking people! It makes the game last forever...), offers an experience that can be pretty rewarding.

Many "gamer's games" are actually fairly complex with a much higher learning curve than Scrabble or Risk. While there is reward, imo, for mastering such games, many people simply do not have the inclination. That being said, there are gateway games which have crossover to mass markets and being able to create such a game is actually a very big accomplishment. (Hello Alan Moon!)

What we gamers need to do is learn to recognize such games (Ticket to Ride, Splendor, Settlers of Catan, Telestrations, King of Tokyo etc.) and convince our friends and family members to play them with us, and then go out and buy them. But learn to do so without condescension for the games they already know and might like.

 

[Grainger]

There are plenty of mass-market games that come and go, but the evergreen are evergreen for a reason. Firstly, they are generally very easy to learn. That right there is a huge plus. Sure Risk devolves easily into a lopsided game, but you can learn it in about 5 minutes, which for a war game is pretty good. Clue is subject to roll and move, but other than that, as a deduction game it's solid. Scrabble in particular is hard to beat, imo for what it does, though I think Word on the Street might come really close to having higher mass-market appeal. Even Monopoly, so often derided, if (huge caveat) you play it as actually written (stop putting money in Free Parking people! It makes the game last forever...), offers an experience that can be pretty rewarding.

Many "gamer's games" are actually fairly complex with a much higher learning curve than Scrabble or Risk. While there is reward, imo, for mastering such games, many people simply do not have the inclination. That being said, there are gateway games which have crossover to mass markets and being able to create such a game is actually a very big accomplishment. (Hello Alan Moon!)

What we gamers need to do is learn to recognize such games (Ticket to Ride, Splendor, Settlers of Catan, Telestrations, King of Tokyo etc.) and convince our friends and family members to play them with us, and then go out and buy them. But learn to do so without condescension for the games they already know and might like.

I agree with a lot of your points, but I'd still argue that most of the games listed are quite poor. I'm not saying you can't have fun playing them, but they really have been superseded by better designs, which do what the aforementioned titles do but better. That the "classics" still sell better is, in my opinion, mainly to do with inertia and marketing, at least in the UK - I don't know about the US. The exception would be Scrabble, which does what it does perfectly if you like that sort of thing. I'd also disagree that these "classics" are particularly easy to learn, compared to equivalent modern games (yes, there are far more complex modern games, but that's by the by).

To be honest, when I ripped into those games, I didn't mean to offend anyone - this is a gaming forum, and I assumed awareness of how badly regarded those games are with board gamers. It was more of an in-joke than anything, that I though everyone would be in on. I didn't know there would be avid fans who would be offended. In short I'd say that if you like these games, well and good, but please do have an explore on boardgamegeek, or ask around at the next con you go to. I wager you'll be pleasantly surprised at the variety of great games on offer, and you won't (or hardly ever) will want to go back. But if you don't like then, then sure, go back to your favourites.

 

[aka_pg]

I'd still love to see a D&D themed M:tG expansion! Imagine casting Bigby's Crushing Hand or attacking with Orcus! I won't hold my breath, however.

 

[aka_pg]

Just realized that last comment might have seemed random. I was responding somewhat to the Candyland as D&D setting. How about a Ouija and Cthulhu tie-in? OK... I'm done now.

 

[Ed_Laprade]

According to a quick google search, it means being on a winning streak, or having a sudden burst of energy. I'd not heard the expression before, either.

Still, good news for 5th =)

It can also mean going on a drunken bender!