D&D 5E I just don't see why they even bothered with the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide.

[Jester David]

Um... so, out of four transitions (1st -> 2nd, 2nd -> 3e, 3e -> 4e, 4e -> 5e), only three of them provide story justifications?

Three out of the four had Realms-specific story justifications. The 2e to 3e story-justification was Die, Vecna, Die and set in other settings but not the Realms. However, the changes arguably affected the Realms.

 

[JeffB]

I dunno. My group and I used it exclusively and separately from any previous FR info just fine in my heyday. Gave me everything I needed to run a FR-light game.

If you did that iss great, but it was not intended to be intro to the setting at all. I use it quite often in my games. It was a gap product while TSR worked up the " big gold box" (and later big grey box) sets.

Can you run a game just grabbing a city map? Sure. But FRA is nowhere near the same intended purpose as the SCAG. It does not provide a intro to the Realms or even the Heartlands. Its a collection of cities and maps that had previously not been detailed and a bunch of crunch as well as an extremely brief "lore" update about the ToT.

I just did a comparison yesterday. This was my assessment:

see above. FRA is a horrible product to hand a new player and say "here, this will give you an overview of the setting and area as well as provide some character background/advice, and new character options for our upcoming Forgotten Realms campaign". THAT is actually what the SCAG is good for...I don't have any use/need for it personally, but It is far more akin to the 4E FR Players guide or the 2E Players Guide to Greyhawk, than it is to FRA.

If I gave FRA to the kids in my group and asked them to use it as prep for an upcoming FR campaign, I'd get a whole lot of "WTF?"

 

[Jester David]

I think the irony is is that TSR would have thrived in the current rpg enviroment, with stuff like kickstarter campaigns, pdfs, ect... they could have tailored there production far more to thier consumers, the current era of rpg allows for more flexiblity, makes it easier to dodge products that will be unpopular, ect...

If TSR had had these options like Print on Demand, PDFs, Kickstarters, Surveys, forums, virtual tables, ect... they would never have gone under, they would still have been able to produce most or all the content that they did.

Most of the problems could have been avoided, costs would have been cut ect...

That's some pretty massive speculation though.
TSR went under due to massive mismanagement and limited coordination between the people who designed the products and the people who set prices. There were products that were sold at a loss, and products ordered at much higher print runs than necessary. Adding something like Kickstarter to the mix where you have this extra layer of fees (Kickstarter and Amazon) would potentially have added another layer of complexity to mismanage, resulting in more money lost. To say nothing of trying to handle shipping fees and arrange backer rewards.

 

[Shasarak]

I like Mike Mearls, but he's shouldn't be comparing how 5th edition is being handled to how TSR handled things, or how pre hasbro WotC handled things or hasbro has handled things in 4e.

I agree because while there are certainly lessons to be learnt from TSR there are greater existing challenges from WotC business structure like for example trying to produce products without any Editors on staff. Now that is an example of a problem TSR never suffered from in any meaningful sense.

 

[pukunui]

[MENTION=518]JeffB[/MENTION]: Oh sure. It's not a proper player's guide, but it's sort of the closest thing to one that the 1e/2e Realms got, isn't it? And yes, I agree that the SCAG is a much better product to hand to a new (or new to the Realms) player than the FRA would've been. At least the SCAG doesn't spend 11 whole pages on gems!

As I've said previously, the SCAG is essentially the 5e version of these two books:

 

[hawkeyefan]

Who cares? Who wants to be forced to read half a dozen (possibly crappy) novels to figure out stuff that should be explicitly stated in any kind of campaign guide?

Not that I'm a FR-booster, mind you, but to me, this is such a bizarre choice that I just find it baffling.

I was genuinely asking because I haven't read the novels, and I don't really plan to. I just figured that anyone who really did care that much about what happened during the Sundering would have the novels as a go to for answers if they chose.

But it seems the novels are no more specific then the SCAG. Which I have to say at this point seems pretty deliberate on WotC's part. Seems they want to leave things vague until a story (whether game or novel) requires something be specific.

 

[Corpsetaker]

Google is your friend. From this site: http://dlair.net/2015/03/22/lean-mean-rpging-machines/

I just want to say that I don't believe that BS that Mearls said for an instant.

Reasons:

1: If the way 3rd edition was handled was bad then how come it lasted so long and still exists in the guise of Pathfinder which has spawned it's own following?

2: 4th edition was bad for 4th edition and not some over zealous release schedule. So many people simply didn't like the rules so they bought less books.

When you have a fantastic rule set then books are purchased on the back of that. That whole thing Mearls said is nothing but new edition strategy justification spin. 5th edition is a fantastic ruleset that many people obviously enjoy so if you picked up the pace on books then those books will be purchased. You also can't go in with the corporate attitude that every book you put forth is supposed to sell more copies than the last.

The sad thing is, since a corporation has taken over D&D it stopped being about what's good for the customer and more what's good for the corporation and in so doing this, has made people believe that their current strategy is what's best for the game when it's actually not.

So Mike Mearls, here are the things that are bad for D&D: Corporations, profits treadmills, and bad spin.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

TSR and WotC (before Hasbro) were both corporations.

 

[pukunui]

The sad thing is, since a corporation has taken over D&D it stopped being about what's good for the customer and more what's good for the corporation ...

Right, because doing what was good for the customer and not what was good for them worked really well for TSR. Which, by the way, was also a corporation.

 

[Corpsetaker]

TSR and WotC (before Hasbro) were both corporations.

Not like Hasbro they weren't.