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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mercurius" data-source="post: 8487282" data-attributes="member: 59082">Yep. Which is why targeting for any specific set of "values" or trying to capture the "latest trends" leads to problems. I mean, it is one thing to broaden the scope of what D&D is, quite another to say "D&D is now about Y and no longer about X."I'm reminded of some advice a literary agent gave, which is not to worry about trends, whether your work fits in with it or not (or worse still, trying to adjust your work to a certain trend that you have little or no interest in). In fantasy literature, new trends generally don't mean a sea change as much as they are a broadening of what fantasy means. The old stuff doesn't go away. So for instance, when "grimdark" became the thing, it wasn't like all of a sudden all other tones of fantasy stopped being published. There might have been a few years where grimdark took up a larger percentage of market share--at least apparently so--but then the wider genre adjusted and integrated grimdark as another thematic sub-genre. Furthermore, people change. A person's values and worldview at 30 or 40 is probably (hopefully!) not the same as it was when they were 16. This ties into another reason why going for the current trend is not recommended: by the time you get to publication, things might have moved on.Or to put it another way, I think the best way forward is "both/and" not "either/or." Meaning, you can play traditional style D&D and kill things and take their stuff, or if you want to roleplay magic masquerade balls and academic politics, we'll provide that too. D&D is now big enough for a big umbrella approach.But for that to be successful, two things have to happen:1) WotC has to honor the big umbrella, and publish a range of thematic offerings.2) The fan-base has to accept that not every product was written with them in mind.I think the former is more likely than the latter.</blockquote>

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