D&D 5E Is 5E "big enough" for a Basic/Advanced split?

[Enevhar Aldarion]

There are very few people on this forum that played AD&D, much less basic. I played basic probably once and my impression was that it was a simplified version of the game. Then again, that was long, long, ago.

Huh, I always got the impression that this forum was heavily slanted toward the "old timers" who started playing pre-3rd Ed D&D and that the players here who started with 5E were in the minority.

 

[Parmandur]

Huh, I always got the impression that this forum was heavily slanted toward the "old timers" who started playing pre-3rd Ed D&D and that the players here who started with 5E were in the minority.

More slanted tha. The general population is, but it's not uniform: I was born in 1985 and started with 3.x

 

[Eyes of Nine]

Whether 5e is big enough for it, I don't know. Whether WotC will do it, I strongly doubt.

This, 1000%. There is no business upside for WotC to split the player base between a "Basic" brand and an "Advanced" brand. Operationally they would each probably have their own budgets, and their own dedicated marketing folks and dedicated designers. Will it generate 2X+ sales? No way.

D&D is a golden goose. You don't spatchcock it and serve it up to different consumers.

 

[billd91]

I don't know about that. I was in my teens when I started playing in the 80's and I, and all the other teens I knew who played, chose AD&D over Basic, because, well, we felt like we were advanced ourselves and did not need to play a simplified version of the game.

That fit us as well. We did start with the Holmes Basic and the Redbox, but since neither went very high levels, we assumed the next logical step was to go to Advanced D&D.

As far as confusing people in any kind of market test now, you have to have a well-known basic edition for the "advanced" version to make any sense. TSR had that and people like us still got confused and conflated the two. So, yeah, I can see test marketing the idea not going well.

 

[Oofta]

Huh, I always got the impression that this forum was heavily slanted toward the "old timers" who started playing pre-3rd Ed D&D and that the players here who started with 5E were in the minority.

There do seem to be more old timer players than in the general populace, and while I'm not sure what the percentages are I doubt we're in the majority. Or even if we are, many of us haven't played the older editions since they were current. I know there are a handful who still play the older editions, but personally I haven't played AD&D or basic this century.

 

[S'mon]

I have never seen anyone running the game on the Basic rules alone. Is that a thing people actually do?

It would be cool to see Mystara released with support for Basic Rules play. I'd especially like to see NPCs given classes using the Basic Rules rather than always refer to an NPC stat block. Currently I don't think D&D Beyond supports the Basic Rules as they differ from the OGL.

 

[S'mon]

Here's a related question:

I don't play with strangers often, other than when I run convention games (which are usually not D&D, because a con is the one time you can collect 6 people to sit down for something else).

What are the general expectations as far as option availability and/or optional rules inclusion for the average group of random players who found one another on a Discord server or whatever? Do most people come to the table expecting to be allowed to use anything in an official source? Do most DMs of random groups allow everything?

IME they expect to use everything on D&D Beyond, but don't rage quit over limited sources.
They do rage quit over 'roll group initiative' funnily enough. They tend to REALLY REALLY want to have their own distinct turn where no one else is acting. This is by far the biggest deal breaker I have seen.

 

[Parmandur]

I have never seen anyone running the game on the Basic rules alone. Is that a thing people actually do?

I mean, we did it before the PHB came out in 2014. I'm sure plenty of middle schoolers use those tunes, because they can't find the books and want to try the game.

 

[S'mon]

I mean, we did it before the PHB came out in 2014. I'm sure plenty of middle schoolers use those tunes, because they can't find the books and want to try the game.

When I introduced a middle schooler to 5e, he had not heard of the Basic rules. I gave him the remains of my first print PHB & MM that had fallen apart due to faulty binding and kindly been replaced by WoTC in 2015.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

IME they expect to use everything on D&D Beyond, but don't rage quit over limited sources.
They do rage quit over 'roll group initiative' funnily enough. They tend to REALLY REALLY want to have their own distinct turn where no one else is acting. This is by far the biggest deal breaker I have seen.

I have never played in a D&D game from any edition where we used group initiative for the players or the monsters.