Interview with Scott Rouse, Chris Perkins & Bill Slavicsek

[FreeXenon]

Shadow is found in Lords of Madness.
I do not know about the Warbeast.

 

[Razz]

Shadow is found in Lords of Madness.
I do not know about the Warbeast.

Warbeast is in Monster Manual 2

 

[Thomas Percy]

My main concern with this change, aside from the portability issue, is what will happen to Greyhawk. I'm a huge fan of Greyhawk.

And I'm a fan of BIRTHRIGHT and there were almost none BIRTHRIGHT's content in Dungeon and Dragon. So, It can be better now, because WotC will use broader platform.

One question:
Is it possible to every fan who wrote interesting material, to contribute to this new platform?

 

[TheYeti1775]

*Snip*
One question:
Is it possible to every fan who wrote interesting material, to contribute to this new platform?

Why not post it here?

 

[Swordsage]

Removed by admin.

 

[Piratecat]

Hey, you know what the best thing is about passive-aggressive sniping? It's... umm... you know, I've got nothing.

Conversation in this thread that furthers the discussion is absolutely welcome. Comments that make snide jabs at other members are not. Plan accordingly.

And as always, email me if this is somehow unclear.

~ Piratecat

 

[SavageRobby]

And here is an interview with Liz Schuh.

I smelled an awful lot of ifs and maybes from that article. Not much of substance.

Remainder removed by admin. Once again, it's really easy to discuss the content without making personal attacks on people. I'm a little surprised that I have to point this out yet again.

If this is somehow unclear, please email me. Otherwise, I don't expect to see any further problems in this thread, please.

~ Piratecat

 

[Khairn]

Over the past few weeks Ive tried to articulate my doubts and worries about the DI (never mind my feelings about the cancellations) but now I have found an excellent post which summarizes them beautifully. The post can be found http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=836212&page=4. The salient points are the following ...

1. Portability. Whether I want to read my magazines on the john or not, a computer/laptop is *not* as portable as a magazine. I don't care what the gear-heads say, (and back in the 80's & 90's, I used to be one, but I guess I'm just getting too old to keep buying more crap just because its 'new' and 'digital') reading a PDF on a computer screen sucks, sucks SUCKS! It will *NEVER* replace having a good old printed magazine to read whenever, wherever I want to, whether that's on the throne, in my recliner, in bed, on a train/plane/automobile or even standing at the mailbox with the plastic cover already off, flipping through the articles even as I start to wander back to the house from the street. I *can't* read a PDF anywhere but at my computer. (Look how many people have said that even though they work on computers for a living, they don't want to read magazine-style content on a computer.) I'm sorry Chris, but digital might be cheaper, might even be more flexible in delivery and content, but it just *can't* replace magazines.

2. Subscription elapse. I have subscribed, let expire and resubscribed to both Dungeon and Dragon several times over the last 25+ years. Every time I have let the subscription expire, (for a variety of reasons) I still have the magazines I bought. They haven't lost their utility for me. I still thumb through them on a regular basis, for ideas and just for the simple pleasure of reading about D&D. When my current subscription expires when WotC kills the magazine, I will still have my copies. They are mine, to do with them as I please, and unless I have a life-changing experience so radical that I become a different person, I will have them until the day they bury me and I pass them on to my kids, (and maybe grandkids.)

Given that I understand the NDA's that y'all are operating under, (and oddly enough, unlike many other here I have no problem with. You have been gagged officially, and I can't find fault with your inability to provide information we feel entitled to) I don't expect you to be able to answer this question, so I put it out there for your consideration: When a customer subscribes to the DI, once their subscription runs out, (for whatever reason) will they still have access to the material that they *did* pay for throughout their subscription? If I was told, once I had paid my subscription, that once it ran out I had to return all the magazines I had already paid for, you would have seen one ticked off gamer. You will see some ticked off gamers if you do that to the DI, and I hazard a guess that the DI will fail if that's the business model. I might be completely off-base with this issue, but I believe its a legitimate concern.

3. DRM (Digital Rights Management) Will DI content be managed to the point that it can't be copied, moved or archived on CD? If my computer had a complete melt-down and I lost all of my data, would I be able to retrieve it through an archival service with WotC? I realize that if my house burned down and I lost all of my magazines in the fire, I couldn't expect the publisher to replace them, but since digital is being touted as this wonderful new way of delivering content, could I expect that with my digital subscription? (If this is true, then I will admit that might be a selling point for me for the DI that mitigates some of the negatives I associate it with.) The way that the RIAA went after Napster and other file-sharing services and how pycho the music industry has gotten over DRM, I think that this is a legitimate concern. (And again I am not expecting you to be able to non-NDA this. It's just an issue.)

4. Printing. This one has me torqued. I'm sorry, but I willingly pay a subscription to a magazine and I get a nice, colorful, glossy and bound physical thing in my hand. If I subscribe to the DI, I get 'virtual' data that exists only as electrons and a series of 1's and 0's on my hard-drive, (or yours, depending on the DRM issue above.) If I want to use it away from my computer, (see issue #1 above) then I have to print it on my printer with my paper. I pay for it once, then I pay for it again when I print it. Not only does it cost ME paper and ME the cost of color printing, (which is outrageous anyway) but I don't get it glossy, sharp or even bound! A stack of printer-paper, (which likely as not is recycled and not of sterling quality) printed on one side with blurry pictures and now I have to somehow secure it. Let me tell you, as a consumer and customer, this SUCKS.

I realize that several WotC posters have commented on a 'best of..' type compiliation that will be printed and I can have my print that way. Unfortunately, somebody else decides what is "best", not me. I might not agree with that. I want to be able to decide what is best from the lot, not depend on somebody else's opinion. If it made it into the magazine in the first place, it should already be the best from amongst all the submitted material, right?

5. Accessability. When I didn't have a subscription to either magazine, many times I would pick one up anyway off the magazine rack. I would flip through them, check it out and decide to buy. If I didn't like next month's, I wouldn't get it. Will the DI have the same flexibility? I saw in a response on the ENWorld boards that customers would have the ability to look before they purchased, but I couldn't tell if that meant before they bought a month's long subscription or if it could a month by month purchase. I did see that it wasn't machine-specific, i.e. I could access my subscription from another computer. This is a good thing.

6. (finally) Bundling. If the DI includes games that I have no use for but I still have to pay a full subscription to get what I do want to see, you won't see me paying for it. On the magazine rack I see (or at least for a few more months will see) Dungeon, Dragon and then magazines for the other games put out by WotC that I couldn't have less interest in. I won't start insulting players or designers of other games with my reasons for why, but I play D&D/RPG's and I am NOT interested in paying any sort of money to see them combined with other games that I despise in many ways. I am sure that many of the players of those 'other' games feel the same way about my D&D and wouldn't want to pay to get access to their content mixed in with mine. If Wizards put out a general magazine with content for *all* of their games, I don't think it would have the success of their specialty mags.

My thanks to Caird over on the Wizard boards for this excellent summary.

Hey Chris or any of the other WotC folks who are lurking, please print it and keep it on hand. Success or failure of the DI for me will depend in a large extent on how you answer these 6 points.

 

[Hussar]

6. (finally) Bundling. If the DI includes games that I have no use for but I still have to pay a full subscription to get what I do want to see, you won't see me paying for it. On the magazine rack I see (or at least for a few more months will see) Dungeon, Dragon and then magazines for the other games put out by WotC that I couldn't have less interest in. I won't start insulting players or designers of other games with my reasons for why, but I play D&D/RPG's and I am NOT interested in paying any sort of money to see them combined with other games that I despise in many ways. I am sure that many of the players of those 'other' games feel the same way about my D&D and wouldn't want to pay to get access to their content mixed in with mine. If Wizards put out a general magazine with content for *all* of their games, I don't think it would have the success of their specialty mags.

Isn't it interesting that once upon a time, the much touted strength of Dragon was the fact that it covered a number of gaming systems and not just D&D? How does an article about Magic detract from articles about D&D just because they appear in the same place? This was done for many, many years and it wasn't until fairly recently that Dragon became a D&D only magazine.

 

[deadDMwalking]

One aspect of Dragon that I think is noteworthy is the ability of the publishers to respond to feedback, both positive and negative.

I don't think it is possible to make a product that everybody will like. Even if everyone does like it, there will still be people who think it can be improved. I won't argue that point.

The magazines had subscribers and regular readers - enough that the magazine was making money. So far I have not seen anything from Wizards of the Coast (including the letter I just received in the mail I posted on the wizards.com boards) that indicates that there is a reason they can't offer both print and electronic content, other than that they think the online content will be 'better'.

I disagree.

I've been hoping to see a clear explanation for how a strictly online format is better. NDA notwithstanding, nobody seems willing to touch that issue.

WotC has done a lot of good things for the game. The magazines have also done a lot of good for the game. WotC has garnered a lot of ill will by making sure fans know they're taking away the magazines and offering us a poor substitute AND taking away our choice in the matter.

If the electronic content is truly superior, if they ran them side by side and the magazines ceased to be profitable, they'd have an undeniable excuse to cancel the magazines. Very few people expect a business to keep doing something that loses money. Those that do are unreasonable.

I'd say that WotC has ticked off a lot of reasonable people. Now, maybe they 'know something that [we] don't know'. Maybe not. I know I'm pretty sick and tired of hearing that they know what customers want and yet, I keep getting really angry with them. I've kept buying WotC products that I think could be vastly improved. I can't believe that they release books without an index. Still, I've bought them because WotC makes D&D, and I play D&D. Well, I have enough books, so I won't keep buying from a company that cares so little for me as a customer.

And while I'm still angry about the cancellation of the magazines, I'm starting to really become happy that I won't be buying any more of these books. While it will be greatly disturbing not to have the magazines for a few months, I think they'll come back.

This is a monumentally bad decision, but the 'powers that be' are determined not to see it. Time will tell who is right and who is not. I had hoped they would choose to avoid the mistake, rather than disregard the kind wishes from everybody who hoped they would change their mind before the mistake was 'unreversible'. That won't happen.

There is a fundamental disconnect somewhere between what customers want and what WotC thinks customers want. I don't know where it comes from, but eventually they'll figure it out, or they'll spin D&D off and another company will pick it up, and maybe, just maybe, do it right.