WotC How much does Hasbro / WotC impact your feelings towards D&D?

[TheSword]

I know that previous D&D wasn't perfect, but it also produced far more product than D&D 5e, so yes, the average was in my estimation significantly higher, and there a lot more choices than WotC currently provides. I used the word "average" on purpose.

They produced immensely more guff - and yet you think the quality was higher? I think if you were to go back and reread the majority of AD&D products now with a critical eye rather than a nostalgic one you would be very very disappointed. Sure there were gems but I think we were even more used to mining products for ideas back then than we are now. My experience of it was that AD&D and it’s multitude of settings were good on ideas, poor on execution. But we gave them a pass because we had nothing to compare it to and we were all homebrewing and cobbling stuff together back then.

Now if a writer asks you to read the 5e adventure campaign book before play they get looked at askance and criticised for it. “How dare you ask me to read the book! I should be able to pick it up as I go!”

A thread is created pointing at the 2024 rules with a dozen or more zany combinations that seem to work in contradictory or unrealistic ways and there is a chorus of “WotC can’t write for crap”. Can you imagine if we combed the same quantities of crunch for AD&D and all set to analyzing it, the kind of stuff would would find. It would fill pages - I guarantee it. The difference is we didn’t hold them to that standard.

 

[TheSword]

It's discouraging to me to see that 65% of respondents are cool with what we've seen from WotC/Hasbro.

I wouldn’t say I’m cool… I just don’t think it even comes close to the bar to make me dislike them as a group let alone hate/boycott them.

While at the same time the good stuff they do is great and I find it really fun and inspirational like the new PHB and most of the Adventure Paths.

 

[Retreater]

That's not what the poll is asking.

I know that, since this is a site where feelings run hot, people feel strongly about the company. And that's fine! But this is asking how those feelings impact how people feel about D&D- which isn't the company.

In addition, I am guessing that if this was a survey of the greater D&D playing population (and not Enworld), you'd be a lot more disappointed

There seem to be a couple different questions asked.
Do my feelings about WotC/Hasbro make me...

1. dislike the brand of D&D and supporting them financially? Yes
2. dislike playing officially branded, current products of D&D? Yeah, a bit. I don't want to encourage the purchase of new material because it connects to Issue #1.
3. dislike playing what I have already purchased? Yeah, a bit. I'd prefer to highlight companies I like better. Plus, when you stay in the ecosystem you tend to purchase stuff that connects to Issue #1.
4. dislike the hobby in general? A little because I am losing connections with the community because I'm not excited about 2024. No one on these boards is going to want to talk about Dragonbane or anything that's not D&D 5e.
5. dislike the fandom, and merchandise connected to D&D? Absolutely. I don't want to promote that brand anymore.

In short, there's no aspect of my interaction with WotC/Hasbro that doesn't affect me on some level.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

In short, there's no aspect of my interaction with WotC/Hasbro that doesn't affect me on some level.

Again, though, that's you. And those are perfectly valid feelings to have!

I would just say the following-

1. IMO, the vast majority of people who play D&D don't care about the company. They are more causal. The forums of enworld are definitely not representative of the overall D&D hobby.

2. Of those who follow the company, people can care about the decisions they have made in different amounts, or assign different normative values to those decisions.

3. Finally, even if people don't like the company's decisions, they might just have a different metric in terms of it impacting their purchasing decisions. For example, some people might not every buy a VW (overall brand, incl. Audi, Porsche, SEAT, etc.) because they still are angry about the lyin' diesel gate. Others might try to avoid Exxon because of the, um, Exxon-ish of it all. Some still refuse Chick-fil-a. And so on. For you, their recent actions might have crossed that line. For others, it's nowhere close. But I would say that this is more a personal decision than a moral imperative.

It's all good. I think that when we are personally invested in something, we tend to overestimate how others might perceive it. YMMV.

 

[O-Castitatis-Lilium]

I answered 1 here. What WOTC does with their time, their company, and their own PR...I honestly can't be bothered to care about them and their antics. What they do as a whole doesn't effect how I view D&D as a game that is separate from the company. What they do and say has no bearing on how I run my games. What products they do or don't put out doesn't effect how I play and run my games. What choices they make don't effect how I play and run the game; it's just that simple. D&D is a separate thing from the company. If it wasn't, then TSR would still have a hold of it and it would have died with the company when they went out of business. It didn't though, it was sold, much like milk at the grocery store is, and now WOTC has it. What WOTC does has no effect on how I feel about D&D as a game.

Now, if this had of asked if what WOTC is doing effects how I feel about WOTC? That would have been a different answer completely. WOTC has done some...well, I hesitate to say better things, as TSR had a worse track record than WOTC, but they have done SOME things that are good, but still not enough to really outweigh the bizarre stuff they have tried to pull recently. Honestly, I could care less if WOTC screw up or not, because at the end of the day, if they want to run their company into the ground, that's their choice and it doesn't effect me either way. It's not like I have a stake in their company or anything. Despite my indifference to the company, if something they do or say is bad enough that it reaches me, someone not constantly scouring the web for WOTC news, then it's obviously bad enough for it to really put a mark against them on how I feel abot them as a company.

 

[Retreater]

3. Finally, even if people don't like the company's decisions, they might just have a different metric in terms of it impacting their purchasing decisions. For example, some people might not every buy a VW (overall brand, incl. Audi, Porsche, SEAT, etc.) because they still are angry about the lyin' diesel gate. Others might try to avoid Exxon because of the, um, Exxon-ish of it all. Some still refuse Chick-fil-a. And so on. For you, their recent actions might have crossed that line. For others, it's nowhere close. But I would say that this is more a personal decision than a moral imperative.

Goodness. I still won't buy VW because of the whole "1940s Germany" thing.
Also, won't eat Chik-fil-A. And wish I could boycott my local grocery store (Kroger) because of their trying to create a monopoly to inflate prices.
So I think we've discovered that I'm very sensitive to such things.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Goodness. I still won't buy VW because of the whole "1940s Germany" thing.
Also, won't eat Chik-fil-A. And wish I could boycott my local grocery store (Kroger) because of their trying to create a monopoly to inflate prices.
So I think we've discovered that I'm very sensitive to such things.

So ... not big into the fashions of Hugo Boss?

 

[Remathilis]

It's discouraging to me to see that 65% of respondents are cool with what we've seen from WotC/Hasbro.

Yeah, just like how my purchases from Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Nestle, or Disney are tacit approval of all the behavior of the company engages in.

 

[Retreater]

Yeah, just like how my purchases from Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Nestle, or Disney are tacit approval of all the behavior of the company engages in.

It's very hard to avoid Microsoft or Google if you're going to use a computer or cellphone. D&D is easier.
Just my opinion.

 

[payn]

dislike the hobby in general? A little because I am losing connections with the community because I'm not excited about 2024. No one on these boards is going to want to talk about Dragonbane or anything that's not D&D 5e.

That’s not true at all. I spend time on EN world because folks talk about all sorts of RPGs. Not only that but you can compare them which is often divisive at their home sites.

Are you going to get 40-50 page threads about how much the companies that make them suck? No, but is that what you are really after?