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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 5847260" data-attributes="member: 82106">Exactly. It is impossible to sort out different factors, and definitely impossible from where we, with no real good data, are sitting. We don't even know ANY real numbers for D&amp;D post-1997. And, yup, hindsight is 20/20. There's more to it than that though. Lets suppose WotC gives up say 1000 customers (these are just simple numbers, not real ones of course) that spend $10 a month on D&amp;D and whom their research says will only buy a product that won't appeal to new customers, and won't likely be around in 10 years. In return they gain 100 new customers right away that spend $20 a month each, but will also be around longer and will keep growing in number slowly over time. Clearly they're losing some immediate revenue. Equally clearly it may be a good move in the long term. It is easy for someone to come along and call that move a 'failure' by examining some book sales chart. The problem is such a judgment is not made on the basis of the same business case and with the same data that it was made with.Of course it is also easy enough for a product group to pitch such a move without knowing ahead how much the loss of old customers might be or just soft sell that downside to management. Then when management sees the numbers they run around screaming and waving their arms and firing people and your perfectly logical and possibly long-run excellent plan may go down in flames. In fact business is rife with this kind of thing. In this sense it may well be that a 5e that is just aimed at those old customers could be the most terrible move imaginable in the long run, and yet be lauded as a brilliant recoup after a misstep by people looking in from the outside. Nor will anyone be able to say later one way or the other what might have been.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 5847260, member: 82106"] Exactly. It is impossible to sort out different factors, and definitely impossible from where we, with no real good data, are sitting. We don't even know ANY real numbers for D&D post-1997. And, yup, hindsight is 20/20. There's more to it than that though. Lets suppose WotC gives up say 1000 customers (these are just simple numbers, not real ones of course) that spend $10 a month on D&D and whom their research says will only buy a product that won't appeal to new customers, and won't likely be around in 10 years. In return they gain 100 new customers right away that spend $20 a month each, but will also be around longer and will keep growing in number slowly over time. Clearly they're losing some immediate revenue. Equally clearly it may be a good move in the long term. It is easy for someone to come along and call that move a 'failure' by examining some book sales chart. The problem is such a judgment is not made on the basis of the same business case and with the same data that it was made with. Of course it is also easy enough for a product group to pitch such a move without knowing ahead how much the loss of old customers might be or just soft sell that downside to management. Then when management sees the numbers they run around screaming and waving their arms and firing people and your perfectly logical and possibly long-run excellent plan may go down in flames. In fact business is rife with this kind of thing. In this sense it may well be that a 5e that is just aimed at those old customers could be the most terrible move imaginable in the long run, and yet be lauded as a brilliant recoup after a misstep by people looking in from the outside. Nor will anyone be able to say later one way or the other what might have been. [/QUOTE]

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