Have the third-party d20 publishers failed?

[Belen]

Negativity. That is all I hear on this subject. We get a lot of people saying it cannot be done. The attitude is already against producing adventures.

It seems to me that a lot of publishers in this thread have decided to take this thread as a personal attack. There are a lot of defensive arguments, but it would be cool to see some brainstorming about how things could work.

Maybe my ideas are not kosher. However, all I read here is a defense for writing more sourcebooks. I would gather that 20% of the market is a sizable chunk. Moreover, I'll bet that 20% far more likely to by the 3rd party sourcebooks, than the 80% players. I do not know about the rest of you, but I only have ONE player in my group who owns a third party book. How many players do you all know that buy the books? How much time do they spend on the game?

I have two book cases of d20 material. So I reckon, I am one of those people supporting the third party market. Now, how much of that material do I use? About one shelf.

Why? Source material sounds really cool when you buy the book, but you soon realize that a whole mess of work goes into making it useful. There is zero support for most source books. Nothing goes into making the life of a GM easier. So rather than use what I have bought, I make it up on my own. Go figure.

So, the main attitude I see is that 20% of the market can shove it. We'll make no move to even attempt to serve your needs. The data supports our stand.

Here is the problem I see with that:

*GMs make up the majority of hardcore "gamers." These are the people who will actually go to the stores and request third party material. Or hang out on the net willin to learn about new third party material.

* I can walk into any hobby shop in my area. I will see all the WOTC stuff. I will see a lot of 3.0 d20 (heavily discounted). I will not see any current d20 third party material.

I have no numbers on my side. True. However, from my observations, it would seem that the GMs may be a significant market for third party material. Yet that is the market you say you do not want.

I have tried to throw out a lot of ideas here. Ideas that I believe could better help struggling GMs. Sorry, but I am not one of the "it's now cool to dis crunch" crowd. Rather than dismiss that market, try serving it. There seems to be some opportunity here.

Here are some more ideas:

Bundles: Try bundling a set of adventures every quarter. Include a low, mid and high level adventure. Allow them to support your IP, but do not make it mandatory to buy it. Cross marketing can be cool. An adventure can be generic and tied to a world.

Consolidate or work together. Isn't that what the d20 license was meant to do? Short story anthologies work. They come from varied authors. Why can't an adventure anthology from different companies work? It has not been tried to my knowledge.

Maybe one reason that adventures do not work, is that no one ever hears about them. On ENWorld there is no separate review section for adventures. I am lucky to even hear about them. I just heard about MOnkeyGod a month ago. I did not even know that Necromancer produced adventures until a 1 year after they started. They are certainly not carried in stores.

I have tried typing "adventures" into google and various other searches, but rarely find anything.

In the end, I buy source books because I see no alternative. They are nice, but without support, they rarely get used.

Just some ideas guys and gals.

 

[Mark]

I have two book cases of d20 material. So I reckon, I am one of those people supporting the third party market.

So you use PDFs much?

I have three published adventures available, and two of them are free.

http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=301

http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=2500

http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=2781

 

[Sketchpad]

Personally, I think that's the way to go: PDFs ... modules aren't as common place these days and, honestly, they shouldn't be. The RPG market doesn't usually target lil' Billy and Suzie ... they usually target the average gamer demographic (which falls around 25-30 IIRC). Give me a good sourcebook with plot hooks over a module anyday

 

[Starman]

Will they make them? Not if the attitude here prevails.

This "attitude" stems from cold, hard facts. This isn't just a bunch of guys saying, "Well, I don't think adventures sell well, so I'm not even going to try."

*Cheers* to the guys at AEG who made the World's Largest Dungeon at a time the market is running rfom adventures.

The World's Largest Dungeon is hardly a standard module. For one thing, it is big enough that it is arguably a setting. For another, check out that $100 price point. It will very interesting to see how it does. However, it's success or failure is not really indicative of how well more standard modules will do.

Starman

 

[Vigilance]

Negativity. That is all I hear on this subject. We get a lot of people saying it cannot be done. The attitude is already against producing adventures.

Maybe my ideas are not kosher. However, all I read here is a defense for writing more sourcebooks. I would gather that 20% of the market is a sizable chunk. Moreover, I'll bet that 20% far more likely to by the 3rd party sourcebooks, than the 80% players. I do not know about the rest of you, but I only have ONE player in my group who owns a third party book. How many players do you all know that buy the books? How much time do they spend on the game?

Well for my own part Im not defensive and dont feel attacked, and I doubt many of the others do either. However, we are trying to educate you on why companies do what they do and it isn't because we aren't trying to please as many of our customers as we can

You comment about GMs being more likely to buy things is exactly true. However GMs are more likely to buy crunch AS WELL as adventures.

In other words, we're not telling that 20% chunk to go take a leap when we make crunch.

But if you could make a product with a market of 1 person or 5 who would you make it for?

Now what if those numbers were 1,000 and 5,000?

Sure 1,000 people is a lot, but 5,000 is like, more

Now when you factor in that the product you can sell you 5,000 costs just as much to make, well, what are we supposed to do?

I don't think we're negative on adventures (I LOVE a well-written adventure). And throwing ideas out is cool. However most of the ideas that you've thrown out don't change the simple economics of the situation.

And again, as I pointed out, 20% of the market is the maximum. A *very generous* maximum. The adventure location will knock a few % off, the level knocks a LOT of % off, if the adventure is hack and slash knock a few % off, and if its heavy into problem solving you can knock a few % off.

In reality I think most adventures appeal to about 20% of all GAME MASTERS. In other words, less than 5% of the market.

We aren't telling you these numbers because we like them. Or because we feel attacked. Or because we live in a box and never talk to our customers.

We tell them to you because they're true and backed up by market research conducted by WOTC.

Chuck

 

[Steel_Wind]

This "attitude" stems from cold, hard facts. This isn't just a bunch of guys saying, "Well, I don't think adventures sell well, so I'm not even going to try."

The point I was making in that post was that a licensed property can sell adventures.

The point many were making was adventures don't sell, simpliciter. That is not an accurate statement when you make it without qualification.

Having made that point, the argument is now twisted as "oh well, we meant standard generic adventures don't sell."

Well - maybe so - but that's not what was said. And doesn't that beg the point, that maybe the adventures people should be making then ought not to be generic?

I am not saying that Dungeon Magazine ought not to make generic adventures - they should. I am not saying WotC ought not to make generic adventures - they should too.

Their markets must necessarily be broader to make sense with the expense of their product's development and the alternative opportunities they forego to make a module.

But if you are a 3rd party publisher, maybe there should be a lot less emphasis on attempting being all things to all people (and failing) - and look instead to exploit the niche markets available for these products - backed up with a license to create product awareness and loyalty.

I appreciate this is not a route available to all publishers. That's ok. But there are an awful lot of sweeping generalities being bandied about here as absolute "fact". They aren't fact - they are generalities.

So - it's not that DMs won't use modules; that is not an accurate statement at all.

It's not that there is no market for adventures either; that's not an accurate statement either. The market may be difficult to exploit - it may need new approaches and a particular focus - but that does not mean that adventures per se are dead on arrival.

It's not that because only one -fifth of the market will buy the product, you are doomed to fail and can't sell 5,000 or 10,000 copies to that one-fifth.

This sort of marketing to the masses math makes sense for WotC - but it need not make sense for 3rd party publishers looking to exploit a niche.

The World's Largest Dungeon is hardly a standard module. For one thing, it is big enough that it is arguably a setting. For another, check out that $100 price point. It will very interesting to see how it does. However, it's success or failure is not really indicative of how well more standard modules will do.

Who is talking about standard modules? Not me.

You? All the others chiming in here? Maybe so - but IF so, stop making the statements without qualification and look for the silver lining and the opportunities.

"DMs won't use modules" is a mantra which is neither accurate nor helpful.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Steel_Wind, I think there were quite enough "as a general rules" and "for the most parts" and "of course there are exceptions" statements in the various comments above to suggest that nobody's trying to make an all-inclusive, carved-in-stone argument. Of course major licenses are going to be the exception, as will some non-standard products like World's Largest. None of that invalidates the general points, though.

 

[Steel_Wind]

Mouseferatu - I understand what you are saying and I don't disaree with that. I think you and I are seeing eye to eye

But the part which Starman quoted and dimissed derisively was a comment proposed and discussing specific licensed properties which have a chance to buck the trend.

The quote which touch this off (for me) was the suggestion DMs don't use prepared modules. I don't think that's true at all - and if it has the appearance of truth among a large number of experinced DMs on ENworld, then I think the sample here is not representative enough of DMs, generally.

Leaving all of that aside, there IS one issue which no one has mentioned and which I think is very material *against* generic adventures; that is the problem of .pdfs

I don't mean the ones we can create and sell - I mean the BOATLOAD of pirated .pdfs floating on the newgroups and p2p networks from the past 20 years+.

That material has not vanished - and most of it is still quite serviceable. It needs a lil updating and DMs run it without difficulty.

Having a massive supply of ready made adventures - most of them acquired for "free" (leaving aside the desirability of piracy, that does not change the fact of its effect and pervasiveness on the market) it takes a lot more these days to motivate someone to go buy a new one.

 

[barsoomcore]

I'm surprised at the venom being turned on publishers who have chimed in on this thread to explain why they don't publish adventures.

In the world I live in, when somebody explains to you why they are following their course, you listen politely and say, "Thank you," when they're done. If you think they're missing an opportunity you say "Did you ever consider X?" If they say, "Yes, and I'm not interested," then you say, "Okay," and maybe consider taking advantage of the opportunity yourself.

You don't insult people. Certainly not busy professionals who are giving you the benefit of their experience and point of view.

If you disagree with the opinions posted here, great. Discussion is all about different ideas getting put up against each other. If you think a great opportunity is being missed out on, take advantage of it. Don't complain that nobody else is.

I've done a fair amount of math on writing and publishing adventures and I get very minimal results -- something like less than $10/hour for my work -- if things go well. So I haven't tried -- I can't risk the loss, and the potential results aren't worth my time. If you see better results, or can risk the loss, go for it. Prove me wrong.

But where is this accusatory tone getting anyone? If you see a market opportunity, and you can't convince anyone else to jump at it, get in there. All you need is enough money to pay a writer and an artist (and those two careers are pretty close to the absolute bottom of the pay scale) and you're in business. If you're not willing to risk a few hundred bucks on this great market opportunity yourself, then maybe you could stop complaining that other people are behaving just like you.

 

[Glyfair]

Funny how WOTC sees the need for adventures all of a sudden.

Actually, it's not "all of a sudden." WotC has always seen the need for them. However, they were hoping the d20 market would deal with that because they didn't sell well at all.

Back in the day, most games were either in the same game world (Greyhawk) or one similar to it.

Actually, "back in the day" there weren't any widely available campaign worlds (indeed, I think only Judges Guild had any for D&D). Greyhawk took quite a while to see the light of day.

You might have a point about them being mostly similiar, though. Early D&D worlds were built around assumptions about the world from the game.

One thing I noticed is a drift in the thread from the original comments. The first post talked about using adventures to drive sales of sourcebooks. All the examples of anything close to resembling a success of this theory has been an adventure tied to a campaign world.

What I personally would and would't buy:

I might buy an adventure that was "generic" and had good buzz (or was by a publisher with a stellar track record on quality).

I would consider buying an adventure tied into a campaign world that either I used or I knew was similiar to the campaign world I used (9 out of 10 times, my own).

I would consider buying an adventure tied to a sourcebook (and advertised as such) if it was an important part of my campaign (for example, something specificly tied to the psionics handbook I would consider buying).

I wouldn't buy an adventure that was advertised as being tied to a sourcebook I don't have.

I wouldn't buy an adventure that included information from a sourcebook I don't own and didn't advertise it (unless they included all the information needed to use the information included in the adventure).

That being said, it will have to be an exceptional adventure for me to buy it, unless it's tied to a setting I'm running.