In what ways would it actually be good for WotC to support 3pps: a brainstorm.

[xechnao]

I am confused. I still fail to see what this thread asks and the answers posted by people are not helping. I mean, the question should not be whether Wotc should support 3pp at all. Wotc has issued the GSL to allow any third party to support it. So, in theory, Wotc already does support 3pp, so it is kind of moot to be asking about this. The question should only be in what ways could Wotc support 3pp so that it could gain a significant benefit out of it.

Anyway, a point to consider is that the relationship among what Wotc publishes and third party publishers is not only a matter of theoretic strategic intentions and expectations. It is also a matter of practical and technical complications that influence and limit the strategies that may work out. At one time, something like the OGL may seem a good idea, the next year it may not.



Speaking of this...is the 4e srd updated to Essentials or is it just referring the PHB?

 

[Beginning of the End]

2. Draw in people that want to play other worlds. If the producers of, say Oathbound, or Arcanis, or Iron Kingdoms thought that they could make money in 4e, they just might draw in some sales for themselves and more importantly draw in customers to switch to this newfangled 4e thingy.

This pretty much covers it. If an open strategy works, it works because:

- A player finds a character concept in a 3PP they want to play, which keeps them playing D&D instead of switching to a different game system.
- A DM finds a world or an adventure they want to run, which keeps them running D&D instead of switching to a different game system.

And by keeping these people engaged with D&D, it keeps them buying D&D products. Which not only means that they'll continue buying WotC's products; it also means that they'll introduce new players who will also be buying WotC's products.

WotC's management, of course, does not believe that this actually works in practice. Which makes it difficult to imagine any argument which would convince them. IMO, WotC's management would need to change before there was any chance of them re-embracing an open strategy.

If WotC had vision, they would realize that they now have the ability to monetize 3PP products in a way that they couldn't in 3E. All they need to do is figure out a way to allow 3PP to sell or unlock content packs on DDI. This would vastly improve the outlook for 3PP (assuming people are correct in concluding that the DDI is the reason 4th Edition fans don't buy 3PP), and even if WotC didn't take any cut of the pie at all they would still be directly profiting by encouraging people to maintain DDI subscriptions.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

First I have to laugh at the idea that the suprme court would hear a case about RPGs....

Ok but Jokeing aside I think 3pp need to really step up there quality control... I suck at balance mechanics and am purely amature, and I can see huge flaws in some.

I think I read from amethyst that there playtesters did not understand there ranged defender, then was shocked to hea they blamed the tester not he class. Then mongoose had some huge balance issues

Most people I know are very wary of third parties today. If wotc could control the quality more and 3rd parties paid for the license that would help




Edit: as long as this parties run the gambit from "better then wotc" to "bad fan work on the board is better" wotc has no reason to trust an open license won't hurt the overall game... As a test go find 5 3.5 players and tell them to daw up 5th level characters but each using rules from different third party books... Then tell me how the game goes. Bonus points if you allow other d20 products like non standard fantasy books

 

[S'mon]

The main thing I think is adventures: WoTC have been pretty consistently terrible at adventures, adventures in themselves don't make very much money because only the DM buys them, so WoTC won't invest in making their adventures better, BUT good adventures get people playing the game, which means lots of sales of the player's-side stuff. So it is in WoTC's interest for there to be plenty of good 4e adventures out there, but not in their interest to devote the resources to making them (and they may even be congenitally incapable of making good adventures - their stuff reads like the authors never read most of the 4e DMG). 3pp adventures are the obvious solution, and obviously worth supporting.

 

[Dias Ex Machina]

I think I read from amethyst that there playtesters did not understand there ranged defender, then was shocked to hea they blamed the tester not he class. Then mongoose had some huge balance issues

Have to step in and say that is not true. At no point did the makers of Amethyst blame their testers for not understanding a class. The issue with our ranged defender was that it didn't have a level 1 marking ability. It was our concept that a ranged defender would want to prevent monsters from not only attacking allies but him as well. We created an abiilty that prevented monsters from getting close to characters. Unfortunetely, despite our initial intent, this is still a controller not a defender. Our fault. Where we disagreed with a couple reviewers was the claim that a defender class HAD to mark targets, and Essentials showed us that this is incorrect.

In Amethyst Evolution, not only do we have alternate powers for make the grounder a proper defender, but the Essentials grounder was split into two classes, a defender and a controller. The defender variant does mark at 1st level.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Ok maybe I miss read your comment on the wotc boards ( and I mean it not just typing it) I am sorry but I see amethyst as the example of a great idea... But if you had access to wotc playtesting and resources it would be way better.

I think that you are right essentials gave the defender aura as an alt mark... But it really is still a mark at will just slightly changed not a lack of one.


I really thought third parties would be great but then on a scale of 1-10 wotc produces solid 8s most of the time but most third parties run the gambit from 1-10 in one product... I and most of my dms nolonger allow books other then wotc be use of it.

We had a warlock pact 3rd party at the early 4e days that had at wills with miss effects and Daily without. The game ended around 6th level but that dm stop allowing 3rd party after that

 

[Dias Ex Machina]

This is why I am proud of Ultramodern4. It has been playtested for nearly two years with over a hundred playtesters. That may not by a WOTC figure but for a 4E D&D 3PP, it's huge. Amethyst Evolution also benefits from that, as both products were produced side-by-side.

The initial issue with producing product so quickly after the release of the core books in 2008 was not only a lack of information about how the rules worked but also their intent.