Interview with Scott Rouse, Chris Perkins & Bill Slavicsek

[Alnag]

I am also more intrested in the possible "annual magazine" or different way of distribution of the online content. If the quality of the stuff is high enough I don't mind to by it in printed form. (If the distributor will buy it of course...).

I also appreciate the response, despite its "we actually can't tell much" character. Still better than nothing. I firmly believe in the information flow and communication with customers. I hope that you meant that seriously and we will see you here or on WotC boards more often not only in times like this, when the community is teared appart.

 

[(contact)]

Thanks for handling this, Morris!

I have to say, I was surprised and a little dissapointed with the general flatness of the interview and lack of information. You really don't have things worked out yet, which explains the silence, heh. Which brings me to my next point:

Yikes.

I think you guys rolled a 1 for your digital initiative.

I feel for you guys; you're kind of up against it now and it sounds like you don't know how you're going to do what it is you're going to do. Four months is not a very long time.

I'm a little worried myself. I work with the Internet for a living, and creating a good online content strategy isn't easy. And in general WotC's Internet presence, and most especially their forays into software development, in the past haven't inspired a huge amount of confidence that they have what it takes.

Quoted for truth.

especially their forays into software development, in the past haven't inspired a huge amount of confidence that they have what it takes.

Quoted again, because it's just that true.

Like everyone else here, I love the game, and I want very much for this to be a great idea and not a mistake, but . . . I think it's a medium with gigantic potential, but so far, the handling of the announcement and the interview aren't filling me with confidence. In some ways, the web is much harder than print. It's not a known thing, it's not . . . hashed out. There isn't very often a traditional way to do things, or crusty old shop foremen who has done nearly every job in the industry over the last 45 years you can ask.

Worse yet, while a magazine is always a magazine no matter who is reading it, websites just aren't the same. The more complicated the delivery, the more complicated that question becomes. The less completely you answer that question, the more you whittle at your potential user-base. It can be a real suck-spiral.

You, me and Wired magazine all think that the future of computing is online applications. But unless you're Google (and even still), they're freaking tough. Aaaand, they take years to make.

So yeah, it doesn't look good for our heroes. A friend of mine recently described an aspect of his business as "fighting the dragon, no spells left, one alchemist's fire and single-digit hit-points." I'm starting to think that's the position you're in on this 'digital initative' as well.

Of course, as a player, I really do hope I'm as wrong as John Terry's training shorts.

-----

Here's my top suggestions/wish list:

1. Keep it focused on the PnP game. Use the site to make my weekly game better, exclusively.

2. Keep your ambitions very simple. Do your core goal (deliver content) and do it as perfectly as you can. Do not chase down the candy-strewn path of "pushing the digital envelope." You've got to show me that your envelope doesn't suck before you try to push it.

2a. Get it right. Just get it right. Seriously. The content is going to be very good-- you guys have good game designers out the wazoo, but you have GOT to get the delivery right. Show us the love. There really is web production value.

2b. Please avoid Flash. I know it's tempting, but making it look like your sweetest Photoshop mockup is ultimately missing the point. That's the candy-strewn path to massively increased development times (a.k.a. less attention paid to function), increased uneccesary load times and all this loss for essentially no user payoff past the first few "cool, rust texture!" impressions. Flash has its place, yeah, but remember our interaction with the site is really the point. "If it ain't go, nobody'll get in."

2c. UI design and IA will be much more critical than an over-the-top look and feel as far as our use of the site goes. Make it smooth, light, fast and intuitive. <french accent> Lak a bootiful 'ooman.</french accent>

3. I would expect to see the site fully searchable by terms and phrases but would love to see it searchable by categories-- think about the kinds of things DMs and players need and allow your content to be sorted *and filtered* by those categories: Authors (natch), monsters, traps, encounters, tricks, descriptive text, DM advice, etc. Just being able to filter down to encounters and stat blocks would be huge for me. That right there would make the site worth it for me, provided it didn't suck to navigate.

4. Make the content portable. No heavy DRM, please! Don't do us like that. PDF output of issues or compliations would be fine, but I have a better idea . . .

5. What I would love to see is the content broken into much smaller modules that can be pulled out of their context and sent into a "shopping cart" . . . so if the article on Orcus had Orcus' stats, a description of his demense, flavor text about his cult, a prestige class and stats for his high-priest, I could pull just that high preist into my cart without taking the rest of the article. Then I could pull a location map from the sweet map gallery, a trap from the trap section and print it all for my game later that evening. THAT would be sweet.

I know you guys will put cool stuff on the site. That's really not the concern. You've got cool stuff coming out the wazoo, and Chris' comment that word count is no longer a constraining issue is music to our ears.

I just feel like the production end might be under-staffed or under-smarted or under-fed, or maybe culled from under the bridge or just under-capable. Prove me wrong, would ya?

 

[Wye]

Not surprisingly, no real meat to the answers given. And what is with that "what would YOU like to see?" I'm all for customer feedback and suggestions, but this is not the time.

Imagine going to an ice-cream shop for your favorite cone:
"Can I have vanilla and chocolate please?"
"We just discontinued those flavors, but we have others, and new ones!"
"Hrrm... Ok, show me what you've got."
"What would YOU like on your ice-cream?"
"Are you kidding me?"

Bringing it back to context: I already told you what I wanted. YOU should be selling me your new flavors (online product), this is not the time for my suggestions.

Having said that, I have to say something just to weight in against some ideas I see expressed here, if I'm to pay for anything at all.

I will NOT pay for "tools": dice rollers, character generators, NPC generators, dungeon generators (oh gawd no!), encounter generators, rumor generators, or any kind of run-my-game-tool-because-I-can't-be-bothered-to-learn-the-rules. Nor any tool that points in the direction of me running a NeverWinterNights game (it doesn't matter how beautiful the interface).

I will not give you my money if I'm going to lose everything the moment I stop paying either.

I wanted to end with something positive, but really I can't think of anything. As others have said, the joy of the magazine was that I could read it anywhere, and it would inspire me on my couch or by the pool. What did I use? Again, as other have said, ALL OF IT, if anything just to inspire my imagination. I'm not going to get inspired sitting at the same screen that I work on and, if your current website is any indication, with a myriad of information crammed on the screen.

I already have a replacement for Dungeon, so only Dragon content would be enticing. But I don't see how I'd be enticed if I can't let my imagination fly by the pool, or comfortable on my couch falling asleep with dreams of fantasy worlds.

Ok, something positive! Scott Rouse, I held you at a very low esteem, being a new gamer trying to dictate what I want; but coming to the boards and establishing a channel of communication with the same people that wanted your head on a platter takes some big cojones. I respect that, I'm willing to listen to what you have to say.

 

[Hussar]

Hey - Hussar, thanks for the link. Looks interesting. That specific item referred to actually running a miniature/map on my computer we the players actually there at the table (and they dont all have laptops). If done right, it could be cool but, as I said, if the players don't have a PC they rely on the DM to move their fig for them. Which can be time consuming (Here? Here? Here? AOO! Oh, you meant here?).

For a virtual tabletop, it might work. Does it have Internet voice? Where do folks join games? Do they have a license from..(nevermind; sorry for that..).

Thanks again!

~D

No worries. Hey, I don't want to spam　this thread, so, let's go here

 

[Ry]

Imagine going to an ice-cream shop for your favorite cone:
"Can I have vanilla and chocolate please?"
"We just discontinued those flavors, but we have others, and new ones!"
"Hrrm... Ok, show me what you've got."
"What would YOU like on your ice-cream?"
"Are you kidding me?"

Thanks Wye - that nails it for me.

 

[Mark Hope]

Interesting read. Thanks to Morrus for taking the time to put this together and to the folks from WotC for taking the time to reply.

I'll clarify up-front that what I have read hasn't altered my initial position that an online subscription service is not for me. I step away from the DI on that basic concept alone.

However...

The fact that there will be print compilations of the online material is a draw for me. I like books. So having this material made available in print later is a big plus. Good show, chaps .

Good to hear that freelancers will be able to make inroads into the DI as well - some great talent has been discovered that way.

(I would like to hear more about the Dragonlance situation, actually. That bit was just confusing).

Downsides for the interview? Well, this...

Morrus: What can an online platform offer to the customer that a magazine cannot?

Chris: We have a lot of ideas that we’re happy with, but let me turn the question around. What would you hope for? What would make this exciting and useful for you? Another question for the community: How much of the magazine content were you able to use in your campaign? How much work did you have to do to accomplish that?

...was just lame. No xp for you! Yes, ask us for our suggestions, of course. But don't use that as an opportunity to dodge the question. Do both! Answer the question and ask for suggestions. As someone who is skeptical about the online nature of this whole enterprise, this was the part where you could have mollified some of my concerns and maybe had a shot at winning me over with your awesome ideas. A missed opportunity, guys!

 

[Eytan Bernstein]

When Wotc says it's going to include something or even suggest it's looking at including something in a product, and then doesn't include it, people get upset. Not "you killed my childhood" upset, but unhappy enough to talk about how WotC "lied" to them and suggest the product is not worthy buying.

I've seen this before. This is one of the big reasons we authors often don't say much about our books until they're in print. Even if the book is written, developed and edited, something may get cut at the last moment for all sorts of reasons. I've had whole sections cut from books days before it gets printed because layout didn't quite manage to squeeze it in, or another book turned out to be a better match for the information, or a license changed, or a late playtest report discovered a serious problem, or a piece of art failed to arrive in useable condition, or someone came up with a better idea at the last moment, or because it turned out to overlap or contradict information from another book in production I never got to see. So I try not to talk about what's going to be in any book until I at least have a preview.

Now, the DI isn't a book, but there are certainly lots and lots of reasons why anything in it might change in the half-year between now and when it goes online. Even if WotC is waaay ahead of schedule developing it, they might change their mind about any one factor. So if they give you any solid details at all, they're forcing themselves to either stick with an idea even if they think of something better or risk further disappointment and anger by taking away something they mention then change.

Because this isn't a book, there just isn't as pressing a need for lead-time. You don't need to know if you're going to pay for this now. Retailers don't need to decide to carry it. WotC doesn't need to convince the book trade to pre-order a few thousand. In fact, WotC doesn't need to "print" them at all, so they have even more time to get it ready than Paizo does Pathfinder. Ultimately, WotC only needs to have everything in place 1 hour before their go-live deadline.

Paizo, however, does need all that lead time. In fact, they needed it before THIS WEEK so they could present what they needed at the GAMA Trade Show. They need to be able to explain what Pathfinder is, and why a retailer might want it. They need to convince people to use leftover subscription money to buy Pathfinder, and find out how many the book trade is going to want. They need time to deal with customers who are losing something Paizo has been selling them. Paizo -has- to be ready starting now. From a practical standpoint, WotC just doesn't.

WotC extended the license to Paizo would be able to finish their existing adventure path. Obviously Paizo has known about this for some time, but no one is upset they waited until the last possible moment to tell us -- the week before GAMA. The fact Paizo had a lot of details isn't a sign of corporate incompetence or some hidden agenda on WotC's part. It's a sign WotC wanted to let Paizo do everything they needed to for this transition to go easily for Paizo, even though WotC isn't ready to reveal details yet. The chance of two companies having all their ducks in a row on two separate projects at the same time is really low. So WotC let the announcement go out now, when Paizo needed it.

If people want WotC to have not said anything until they were ready to give us details, they're likely wishing WotC had made life very difficult for Paizo. I, for one, am glad they didn't.

This is one of the better explanations I've heard for why the timing of this announcement was necessary the way it was done. I hadn't thought about it, but the format definitely impacts a lot on why Paizo needed this time and Wizards doesn't have as much information yet.

 

[Twowolves]

I'm just glad that people are finally starting to calm down and admit that maybe they over-reacted just a wee bit.

If I had a dime for every time someone felt punched stomach in the stomach last week . . . .

Thanks for making my point for me...

The loss of these magazines DOES hurt, some a lot more than others. No one can point at another person and say "your feelings are disingenuous" because we don't really know how they feel deep inside. I personally have hundreds of issues of these magazines, bought almost entirely at the FLGS, at a higher price than I could have paid with a subscription, just to help support the community. I have been reading them continually for over 20 years. Who has the right to tell me that the loss I feel inside is unjustified? Who? No one, that's who.

Apparantly, Helium 3 does, that's who.

 

[Nebulous]

Personally, I feel that a print compendium of the best stuff is one of the few saving graces that i've seen here. Give me a 200+ page of the most popular articles and rules and artwork once a year and that will be spectacular. And i can flip through it ahead of time too.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

Yay for you. So, what's better for you is better for me? :\

Well, no, I wouldn't say so, but any company will tend to go where the customers are - and WoTC thinks the customers will go to the internet over magazines, and that the magazines in print form would detract from the online format. All of that is absolutely up in the air as to whether it is right or not. All I'm saying is that the new format may well be better - for me, as you point out.